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Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001
Trolls seem to be a waste for Chaos at least. They're the same tier you start to get your best line infantry and (iirc) loving wizards. Spawn are one tier up on a chain you want anyway they're not only endgame material but they fight to the death.

Are Fell Bats useful beyond the early game? I suppose if the enemy masses siege units there's no way a matching number of Terrorgheists is cost-effective.

Shumagorath fucked around with this message at 23:47 on Jun 8, 2016

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Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001

Arglebargle III posted:

What are people's opinions about chariots?
The Chaos Gorebeast is worth it just for its absurdly low upkeep when you're going to be on that line anyway for Hellcannons. Performance-wise it seems like the A.I. is way more effective with them than I am, but I'd take a unit of Chaos Knights or Lancers over them any day if their upkeep wasn't clearly a typo.

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001
Whatever VC garrison level gets you Crypt Horrors is worth more than whatever lovely army you could field for the same price. I just had that meager force prevail over a level 13 Dwarf lord when those Horrors held the line as the dire wolves and fell bats mobbed unit after unit until only 13 wolves remained. The dwarfs accepted peace. Meanwhile another stack of Chaos to the west met my smallest force in a heavily wooded area and though it cost me my Black Knights I managed to delay them long enough to have my Vampire lord take out most of their great weapons, my bats mob their marauders and my Crypt Horrors break their trolls over and over. The trees kept their horses trapped and drained them of ammunition against piles of living corpses. As everything began to crumble around me I mobbed their wizard with everything that could still run and their army shattered soon after.

Now I can focus on my last two fronts: Grimgor + Waaagh sieging the gateway to the badlands and Archaon + Sarthorel to the north, the latter having razed Kislev and sent their small warband fleeing. Relief is coming south to beat back the Orcs as my dwarven allies finally muster to take back what they conqured from the greenskins. Archaon and Sarthorel are pinched between Mannfred and Gunther the Scarred, their armies of monsters ready to swoop down on their siege equipment and route their already dying giants. Mannfred and Sofia will pull the Everchosen's life force from his body. My upkeep is draining quickly but I know few will survive to be paid when this is over.

Best Total War game yet.

(What's hosed up is the autoresolve for Archaon/Sarth says I have very low to near-zero chance to win depending on who initiates and against whom, but of course they added back reinforcement on the march in this game which is total bullshit. Otherwise it'd be an easy divide and conquer.)

Shumagorath fucked around with this message at 05:19 on Jun 10, 2016

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001
How does overcast work? I once saw a Chaos sorcerer lord poof out of existence but I've never managed to overcast with anyone despite spamming Invocation at near-zero winds.

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001
What kind of sustained attack do I need to dislodge Hellcannon crew? I have Archaon and Sarthorel reinforcing each other with about ten cannons total and if I take those off the field with bats / wolves / vargs the battle is mine.

Rakthar posted:

For anyone considering a VC or Empire campaign, try the conquer anywhere mod. The ability to expand to useful places pretty much fixed their campaigns for me.

Interestingly enough I wonder if the decision to yank conquer anywhere was fairly late in the game. As VC when I take over Zufbar it has unique province buildings that buff unit xp when recruited, and that sure looks like a logical expansion spot for VCs.

Whether it was or not, the ability to conquer dwarf and ork stuff as humans and vc made things a lot more enjoyable.
Nah. Having vampiric corruption already keeps anyone near me from getting too feisty and with minimal economic management this game would get kinda boring if all I had to do was paint myself a walled corner in time to face north.

Shumagorath fucked around with this message at 23:19 on Jun 10, 2016

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001
Do the Chaos invasions end? I'm at the end of turn 113 and have soundly thumped the first wave with all the legendary lords but Sigvald is already back with a full stack. I'm playing as Vampires and ALLIED with the goddamn Empire now. They and Bretonnia are the 2nd and 3rd most powerful factions and I have to wipe them out before I can win. Worse still my northern border is now Kislev so I'm taking the heat from the invasions first.

Kholek also got dropped by a lone Ostmark witch hunter :lol:

Shumagorath fucked around with this message at 03:17 on Jun 11, 2016

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001

Aurubin posted:

Once Archaeon dies the first time I think it's a finite amount of reinforcement or a full stack was off somewhere you couldn't see and replaced their lord with Sigvald. There's a preference set on Archaeon, Kholek, and Sigvald if they can replace the generic lord leading the horde. Once you've killed off all the stacks you get a message about how it's over, no more chaos corruption mechanic and everyone goes back to hating each other.

:drac:

Now if only I could kill this lone Varg sorcerer by save-scumming but nope your save stores the RNG. It's also nice that Bretonnia might start hating the Empire again so I can get them into a war on two fronts.

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001
Once the Warriors of Chaos are gone how tedious would it be to run through the north in raiding stance sack-razing so I never have to see another nordling again? Can't be worse than the three laps I had to do as Chaos.

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001

Fresh Shesh Besh posted:

Do something different and do things in a different order every time you save scum you'll get some new odds.
Yeah I know that's how it's worked since at least FotS (I feel like Shogun 2 vanilla re-rolled) but I'm not that desperate.

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001

William Bear posted:

Would the regen from Sigvald's Auric Armor and a Seed of Rebirth stack? If so, I can't imagine what could kill him short of massed steam tank volleys.
Maybe chain-casting Spirit Leech?

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001

Ilustforponydeath posted:

I can't for the life of me read Heinrich Kemmler in any other way than Heinrich Himmler.
Probably intentional given the big Ork named after Margaret Thatcher.

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001

Ravenfood posted:

Note to VC-playing folks: rush the Empire, because trying to press west to kill them while the Dwarves start kicking rear end up and down the southeast and the End Time hordes are pouring in from the north is...difficult, to say the least. Plus the fuckers keep confederating my allies away: both the Empire and Dwarves stole an ally of mine by confederating them. They're now Str. 1 and 2, with several more provinces than me, effectively surrounding me, and the AI End Times hordes keep knocking on my door anyway. Its alright, von Carstein is the true Emperor and the way to show that is to lead the charge against the Chaos hordes. I just wish Raise Dead wasn't hosed on my campaign. :(

I spent way too long turn 30-80 not being aggressive enough.
As soon as I got a second army up as VC I made a mad-dash to lay siege to Kharak-whatever immediately south of the mountain pass. Fortunately I caught them after having lost a tonne of turf to Greenskins and just starved them out. The result has been total lack of coordination between the remaining dwarf factions but more importantly none of them confederated. The Empire you can keep at bay until Chaos is beaten for good, then pick your moment to betray them. I had a full military alliance and profitable trade with them so I waited until they went all the way to Estalia and started my attack when the latter were down to a single province. Karl Franz and Gelt had to rush back across the entire map without getting to reinforce from the looks of things.

Also make peace with Varl and Skaeling once Chaos is gone so you give the Empire something else to think about in the north.

Angry Lobster posted:

VC's need much more time consolidating their territory due to their campaign mechanics, it's tedious as hell.
Public order is more affected by corruption than anything else. Get baelfire braziers or whatever set up as you go and you'll be just big enough after ~100 turns when Chaos shows up that you'll be the perfect counterpunch once they've eaten Kislev.

Shumagorath fucked around with this message at 01:09 on Jun 12, 2016

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001
gently caress me Kharak Hirn are dumb. I raze the poo poo out of Kharak Izor for them whom they've been at war with the entire game and set the coordination target to finish them off at their last settlement? What do they do? Sprint in the opposite direction through corruption to fight the loving Varg or something.

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001
I think I'm burnt out on Vampires and ready to give this game a rest. The Empire and Bretonnia both paid hefty sums for peace but both of their kingdoms are still huge (Bretonnia is all the way down the west coast minus one Estalia province). Not sure I want to run another hundred turns like I did with Chaos, and the sad thing is because Altdorf still stands I don't even get a Short Victory.

Archonex posted:

Clearly the Varg have been assholes to them.

A grudge is a grudge. It must be fulfilled. :argh:
But they have Border Princes fighting them in my back yard :psydwarf:

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001
From several pages back the autoresolve codes is basically skewed from the Rome 2 days where sieging with elephants would guarantee the unit was wiped out. Now scale that to single-man units.

If you're having trouble on the field try playing in slo-mo until all your units are engaged. It'll help you avoid situations where the enemy routes and your soldiers stand idle. The overhead map (scroll all the way out) is also good for stuff like forest maps where it's hard to see what's going on.

Coolguye posted:

autoresolve tends to dislike big guys for whatever reason right now - during my most recent empire win i literally never fought on the battlefield outside of one quest mission, because bringing up massive manwalls of swords, spears, and crossbows was just more effective.

e: also as a long time fan of warhammer anything, the event you get the turn after you wipe out Chaos Warriors that ends the End Times and the +2 chaos corruption global event is one of the most cathartic things i've seen in a long time.
What is it? Vampires don't get poo poo.

Shumagorath fucked around with this message at 04:34 on Jun 12, 2016

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001

natetimm posted:

Killing other vamp generals and lords with a bunch of vargheists after their dumb chaff wades in and then dissolves is pretty fun.
You had vamp generals around long enough to get Vargheists?

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001
I would pay money for a mod that lets you ruin all but one Varg / Skaeling settlement at the click of a button. Not to reduce the difficulty but for laughs.

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001
Turns out if you rebuild ruins you don't get the achievement for occupying somewhere i.e. Kislev as VC after Chaos burns it to the ground.

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001

Kanos posted:

I'm pretty sure the way things are statted now, Chaos Knights with Lances are roughly equivalent to Grail Knights.


This is the only thing about playing VC that I hate. Auto-resolve is a massive time saver because holy poo poo gently caress fighting every boring little garrison or mop up battle, but VC are so monster-heavy that you take serious amounts of attrition even against enemies that have absolutely no plausible way to harm your monsters. In past games, I've lost my Varghulf early game by auto-resolving against lovely half-dead Stirland stacks, and I've lost three units of Crypt Horrors to autoresolving against a level two garrison where the autoresolve bar was 100% yellow in my favor.
This is why I'm probably not going to cleanse the north. My best armies are monster-heavy so I'd have to bring my law & order stacks of mass graveguard and pray that Raise Dead can sustain them through the autoresolve march. I could definitely make it through with post-victory Invocation spam but them I'm fighting a gently caress-tonne of horsemen in the north because I don't want to fight them in the south.

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001
Has the Black Coach been tested for whether or not its gimmick works? I can finally build one after shuffling everything around in Eastern Sylvania but I don't know if it's worth it.

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001
His intro from the narrator even says as much.

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001
Is there a hero/lord respec mod yet? Can't find one in the workshop but I feel kinda silly kitting Mannfred out for melee when I miss out on Bjuna/Years.

terrorist ambulance posted:

It's very annoying when your faction leader picks up traits like "harsh" and "unjust". Faction-wide public order penalty in all provinces that you cannot remove unless you don't use your legendary lord.

edit: Also, I just can't seem to get the hang of the economy with some races. Like for Empire - no one wants to trade, I end up winning every battle but still impoverished and barely able to field one stack for most of the game.
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=692561622

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001

Third World Reggin posted:

grimgor too good and most mounts that fly for mages are for position not combat
Manfred's dragon wiped out half a unit of halberdiers in one attack though. It was so rad I forgot my Terrorgheist outside the walls.

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001

Xae posted:

Grimgor is asinine because he has stupid amounts of weapon damage, armor piercing and almost every attack animation he has results in an AoE Stun.

I really don't get why they gimped magic but left in 1000 man killing lords.
My Grimgor in co-op also has the fireball ring and it was absolutely critical to winning an early battle against dwarfs where the fuckers ran down my Doom Diver. We're playing Chaos and Greenskins and everything is so disorganized at my end of the map I'd say CA nailed the setting better than anyone ever has.

edit: I also had a single level 2 dwarf lord and a seriously-depleted unit of quarrelers attack my half-strength base level Orc garrison. I mobbed the lord with everything I had then sandwiched the quarreler unit with goblin spears and he only JUST broke as my first goblin spear unit broke off. Lords in this game cut both ways.

Shumagorath fucked around with this message at 02:48 on Jun 13, 2016

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001

wiegieman posted:

I've found that Vargulf leadership literally does not matter because they win every fight they're in unless it's elite dedicated anti large like demigryph helberds or something. And it regens as long as it isn't crumbling.
Yesterday I ran Fluffy von Carstein into a unit of halberds and a unit of greatswords and didn't even need to check on him once. Can't do that with Spawn and I thought those were the best line breakers I'd ever seen in Total War.

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001
As VC I have a pretty good mix between armies but the Monster armies (even the non Mannfred+Dragon one) feel like easy mode compared to the Wraith-heavy army where I need to actually use my brain to win. On the other hand Drakenhof is the only province I've been able to build the full tech tree for Varghulf + Terrorgheist and have anything else going on. Wraiths I can stand up as easily as Graveguard if I plan for them, but then again I can get loving Crypt Horrors out of even a minor region.

Deified Data posted:

So are there just some settlements that can't be awakened? The first city I came across I was able to sack and then awaken, but the next Varg city I found only let me sack.
It's been like this since Shogun 2. To awaken a faction you need to capture the city where they were eliminated. There are a bunch of pre-set cities in the north with "dead" tribes waiting for you to awaken them. Then you beat them into the dirt again because someone hasn't shortcutted Awaken to Subjugate with a mod. No idea what would happen if faction X's last city before being eliminated was also faction Y's pre-set city to be awakened.

Shumagorath fucked around with this message at 06:04 on Jun 14, 2016

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001
In my co-op game as Greenskins I razed Kharaz-a-Karak instead of occupying it, then occupied it anyway. Someone convince me that was the proper Orky thing to do and not just incredibly inattentive. I've still severely outplayed them anyway despite a cheating 2v1 attack they tried where Grimgor somehow didn't reinforce. Can Orcs not reinforce when mustering, even in a town?

(Oh and of course the dorfs saved themselves at the last second by confederating with a faction four times their own size.)

McGavin posted:

Well, the bonuses stack to become absurd, but that's more of a late game thing.
To add: Character deployments don't seem to stack but passives do. I've been running around with three moneymancers for no reason.

Shumagorath fucked around with this message at 04:25 on Jun 15, 2016

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001

Wafflecopper posted:

The blue ability tree for generals contains the lightning strike ability, which allows them to force a battle with no reinforcements for either side.
Can they even have that at level 6? Thorgrim was reinforcing too and in previous games Night Fighting disabled reinforcements on both sides. Is it lower in the tree for dwarfs?

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001

wiegieman posted:

Always kill Zhufbar if you're VCs, they end up confederating with Dwarfs and you have to kill Dwarfs eventually.

I tried rushing down The Empire as fast as I could, and I got them before they had swallowed up that many provinces. I'll try doing both them and the Dwarfs next time, then I can leisurely stroll through the shattered lesser powers at my leisure.
It's much easier to just rush south with a second stack as soon as Templehof and the other one are beaten down. If you're lucky you'll catch Dwarf HQ with only a garrison and can just sit there starving them out. Dwarfs have really stupid last-gasp confederations though so if they pick Zhufbar then yeah get ready to be still fighting them when Archaon is done with Kislev.

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001

Deified Data posted:

Chaos just isn't clicking. Even during the rare battles that I actually bother to resolve manually none of their units are standing out to me as fun to use. Their beginning is tedious and a pain to restart when you inevitably gently caress something up. The farthest I've made it was turn 100 or so, when Sarthorael spawns, and I had only just started fighting Kislev. I have a premonition. 90% of the fights past that point will be autoresolved siege after autoresolved siege. My enemies will dance around me tauntingly, resettling ruins behind my back as I slowly run out of cities to sack and eventually wither.

I really wanted to like them for how unique they seemed but I'm not sure I'll be able to finish their campaign.

Edit: Is it just me or do Varg and Skaeling do a much better job fighting the Empire & friends when you just leave them alone and don't bother awakening anyone? After 100 turns my vassals never left Norsca. The old tribes would be out kicking rear end by now.
I once spotted Baersonling in Estalia, so no to your last question.

Chaos is the man-for-man strength and discipline of Rome in Attila's horde. It took me 260 turns to win a long campaign and quite honestly I wasn't enjoying their endgame nearly as much as I am VC's at ~180. I was auto-resolving and just building new giants because I had nowhere else to spend money.

xthetenth posted:

Is there a chaos invasion after the one when the first movie plays? I'm wondering if we managed to knock the scripting off track by assassinating Archaon before that happened.
Once the movie plays you just have to knock out all the Warriors of Chaos stacks. Archaon can only be wounded until their last stack is dead at which point he's gone for good.

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001

xthetenth posted:

gently caress. I was hoping that because it triggered at turn 61 it wasn't soon enough yet, I really wanted to try my orcs against them but my friend's VCs have devoured all but one stack.
If it makes you feel any better my friend IS Chaos in our co-op game so no headbutting Archaon for me. On the other hand he's able to fund my war against the stunties while sacking the north.

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001
Finally beat the Empire in my VC campaign and the Varg were nice enough to wreck my Mousillon(?) allies so I could take over all of Reikland. Now it's just a Bretonnia mop-up. Kind of disappointed that I never saw a steam tank.

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001

Ice Fist posted:

The game is better than the other TWs even with those flaws.

I *willingly* did two campaigns back to back and have a third planned. I haven't done that with any other game since Shogun 2 and only did a 2nd campaign there because it was co-op.
Exactly. This is the only TW game where I've finished a campaign and immediately gone back for more rather than wait for expansions.

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=701170286

Great mod for anyone who's sick of Varg and Skaeling pumping out full stacks of max-veterancy units in a couple of turns. I decided to cleanse the north and while I was able to beat Varg down just fine Skaeling raided one ally too many and next thing I knew was charging back south to replenish units and trying not to get mobbed by horses. I installed the mod and instantly those stacks got cut in half with the hit it puts on their economy. It also caps their recruitment at bronze-3; no idea if they get experience for doing absolutely nothing.

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001
Done my VC campaign and not a turn too soon (237, 32k per turn). I might have taken even longer if Mousillon hadn't YOLO'd it and dragged me into war with Bretonnia early. I managed to wipe both the French and all the Norscans off the map at the same time but apparently the Border Princes weren't happy about it and declared war on everyone under five feet tall, leading to all the remaining dwarf factions fighting them and the Greenskins agreeing to become my vassals. Oh, and if you're curious I only managed to recruit a Black Coach by getting lucky with Raise Dead in a province that must have been ankle-deep in blood.

Anyone who thinks Shogun 2 was more fun than this needs to wash their kimono.

DiHK posted:

Seriously, as Chaos I got so pissed at them that I went on a crusade to kill them all with my 2 stacks. 40 turns later I'm about to surrounded by 4 Varg stacks, Lord of Change's stack, and loving Karl Franz.

That run was fun while it lasted. Very challenging. (VH/N)


Welp, that's a reset then.
If you can survive until the next turn the upkeep fees will force the Horscans to dump half the units in their entire army because their economy can't support them any more.


Deified Data posted:

I would like a mod that reduces the AI's inclination to wall their cities - balance it somehow. More expensive walls for the player, bigger garrisons for the enemy. Just give me more actual fights on open ground. Playing Siege Autoresolve Simulator 2016 as Chaos is getting really, really old. I've never been more autoresolve-happy as I've been on this campaign, between subduing Horsca and having to attack every settlement twice to sack/raze it. I do not like Chaos on the strategic layer and I don't really know if I like them in battle because 100+ turns in I don't really know how they play.
I felt this way at the end of my Chaos campaign too (which went to 276 turns THANKS DORFS). No one would fight me in the open and once your Chosen have wrecked everything that dared stand on the walls once you've seen it all. Contrast this with VC where I could take on incredibly siege odds but had to do so by playing to interesting strengths (i.e. monsters mob the walls and smash the gates while infantry ladder/tower up down range and storm the ground).

WHAT A GOOD DOG posted:

Hahaha that's outstanding. I remember one time I was playing as Empire and went south to gently caress up Brettonia and get green wit it. Along the way I got hit up for a trade agreement by Averheim, and they had cleared out and occupied all the vampire counts' territory except for Essen by like turn 50. Thank youuuuu.
I never even fought Bretonnia as Chaos because Estalia took the entire west coast. In my VC campaign it was the opposite with the French conquering all the way to Tilea. Turned out to be a great distraction for their Empire allies though.

Shumagorath fucked around with this message at 08:12 on Jun 18, 2016

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001

Mans posted:


Hahahahahahahahahah
Ahahahaha so many things about that screenshot own. The horscans always demanded I pay them for peace when wrecking them as VC. Did you actually trek up there as Orcs? :orks:

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001

Ice Fist posted:

How is this many stacks even possible in a vanilla game without just going bankrupt?
I think I had that many armies as VC at the very end of the game when I'd min-maxed every province including moneymancers and multiple tier-3 ports and gold mines. I was pulling in 30k+ per turn after upkeep. Basically if the AI is doing that and you're still in the game at all it's cheating.

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001

Flakey posted:

From a few pages back, but this seems relevant:

This was the 2nd turn after he was recruited. :orks:
Twice as Chaos my top sorcerer got sucked into the warp for a forced vacation.

Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001

Wafflecopper posted:

:cry: The AI uses cavalry effectively! :cry:


What do you mean you won't HAVE TO do it again? You didn't have to do it in the first place. If you're not having fun with a game, don't finish it. Jesus.
First reply good second reply bad

(Chaos starts out fun but it's a stupid grind for the back third.)

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Shumagorath
Jun 6, 2001
Also how are people winning VC long at turn 80? poo poo took me 200+.

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