Warhammer Total War: Warhammer 2

[Jaedar]

Well in theory a maelstorm is nearly inaccessible place, where only pirate ships can operate from. And nobody wants to risk theirs fleets by trying to kill some random nearly irrelevant pirates. If they attack theirs enemies, they are even useful. It's far better to guard coast than to create multinational attack fleet just to get rid of pirates.

It works well when you are against it. It's a single red territory in the middle of nowhere, that provides no building slots, and extremely marginal income. And getting there usually means wading through 2-3 turns of massive attrition which makes the garrison fairly scary.

But the ai on higher difficulties completely ignores attrition, and isn't clever enough to recognize a pyrrhic campaign.

 

[underground nymph]

But the ai on higher difficulties completely ignores attrition

Is that so indeed?

 

[Jaedar]

But the ai on higher difficulties completely ignores attrition

Is that so indeed?

it takes 80% less on legendary iirc.

 

[MadMaxHellfire]

i don't know the numbers, but usually even on normal, attrition, vampiric corruption and chaos spread are a non-issue to the ai.

 

[Jaedar]

i don't know the numbers, but usually even on normal, attrition, vampiric corruption and chaos spread are a non-issue to the ai.

The ai also gets bonus to replenishment, and as long as you are in friendly territory replenishment effectively cancels attrition. So yeah, the ai can frequently replenish more than it takes damage from attrition in friendly territory, even on normal.

 

[Average Manatee]

If you are suffering attrition then you never replenish at all. But certain stances make you immune to attrition (encamp-type stances generally).

But the ai on higher difficulties completely ignores attrition, and isn't clever enough to recognize a pyrrhic campaign.

In a sense the AI is correct because fighting lots of small factions is always immensely harder than fighting a single big faction. Every small faction has a base 2000 income, which for the player is enough for a single mid-tier army and for AIs is enough for 1 or 2 seriously deadly armies, and additional settlements might only add 500 income apiece. Because of this its generally always a good idea to take out your enemies starting with the smallest first.

 

[Jaedar]

If you are suffering attrition then you never replenish at all.

I'm not entirely sure how it works, but I did notice that if my army has for example the plague, it will suffer a lot of attrition in enemy territory, slightly less in friendly, and drastically less when in a city. I assumed this was replenishment kicking in and counteracting, but maybe it's something else.

But certain stances make you immune to attrition (encamp-type stances generally).

Iirc encamp and raiding both make you immune to attrition.

Every small faction has a base 2000 income, which for the player is enough for a single mid-tier army and for AIs is enough for 1 or 2 seriously deadly armies, and additional settlements might only add 500 income apiece. Because of this its generally always a good idea to take out your enemies starting with the smallest first.

Correct. And it's really important to blitz them, because if you don't they'll soon have 2-3 full stacks camped out around their final settlement making it very hard to take.

 

[Average Manatee]

I'm pretty sure that's how attrition works since when I have armies with massive (50%+) replenishment then being anywhere that does attrition, even a very small amount of attrition, will totally negate all healing. Sometimes I'll be walking around in my own territory and a few pixels is the difference between getting half my army back and losing a small sliver of it. It might be that you have some built in attrition resistance while in cities or friendly territory though. I believe you're only going to get your replenishment if you have full attrition immunity. There are some rare modifiers that add free replenishment in enemy territory, and it could be that those still work while suffering attrition.

Correct. And it's really important to blitz them, because if you don't they'll soon have 2-3 full stacks camped out around their final settlement making it very hard to take.

And the worst is when you don't have lightning strike and they don't have walls, and the AI is just completely passively sitting around their city all day waiting for you to come at them and get wrecked by a field battle against 2 full armies + garrison.

I usually try going into ambush stance and hoping the AI gets brave enough to start attacking when they think I have no armies around. Usually it works but even then some AIs are still too defensive.

 

[Jaedar]

I'm pretty sure that's how attrition works since when I have armies with massive (50%+) replenishment then being anywhere that does attrition, even a very small amount of attrition, will totally negate all healing.

I'll have to have an attritioning army somewhere and try attaching/detaching a replenishment lord to see at some point. But I probably won't play this game again until WH3 is out with a decent discount, so odds are I'll forget.

 

[Lone Wolf]

Replenishment definitely doesn't work when corruption is the cause of the attrition.

 

[Mitleser2020]

But mods don't fix it. I'm not averse to fixing games with mods, but I don't think there is as mod that addresses this at all. Ranged is so overpowered that it actively makes the game unfun.

Try Better Shields & Missile Nerf and Various Battle Tweaks.
The former increases missile block chance of all shields by 15% and makes missile units noticeable less accurate, the latter increases the effectiveness of armor and will ensure that missile units will fire even if friendly units are in the path of their projectiles.

 

[Lacrymas]

Try Better Shields & Missile Nerf and Various Battle Tweaks.
The former increases missile block chance of all shields by 15% and makes missile units noticeable less accurate, the latter increases the effectiveness of armor and will ensure that missile units will fire even if friendly units are in the path of their projectiles.

Thanks, but I was thinking maybe the Shogun 2 mod would be better. The thing with ranged in this game isn't only that ranged is extremely, grotesquely overpowered, it's also that most other units are useless. So the game needs a complete overhaul, not only a few % tweaks here and there. I recently skimmed through high elf and beastmen playthrough streams on legendary difficulty and both players had the exact same playstyle - 95% of the main army is ranged and consisting of mostly the same unit. When beastmen and high elves play exactly the same, there is a big problem somewhere. I honestly don't understand why people like this game so much and I don't know how streamers (or anyone else for that matter) that have played for 5k+ hours haven't burnt out during the first half of their second campaign.

 

[Average Manatee]

A Beastmen ranged army? How? The only beastmen archer is the ungor raider with pathetic range and no AP damage. Unless you are spamming Cygors, which still probably isn't that good. Beastmen armies are all about Minotaurs.

And again, I have succeeded with melee-based armies just fine on the highest difficulty. You need to know what to do, pick the units that can stack the right buffs, and get good engagements. I can't guarantee that it will work for all races or units (e.g. fuck trying to win with stormvermin or vampire coast melee), but most races with decent to good melee units can run melee armies and win.

 

[Lacrymas]

This is what I came across and thought it represents the current meta because it's from a week ago -

Very hard campaign/very hard battles.

The high elf playthrough I skimmed was from Legend of Total War's very recent attempt at being undefeated.

 

[Lacrymas]

Here's another stream with the dark elves that's currently live -

It's ALL ranged ALL the time. I don't understand how this guy hasn't burnt out from constantly doing the exact same strategies and tactics. I get bored within half an hour when I employ these tactics and I can't force myself to go beyond turn 15ish with Alith Anar because it's so boring and I wish I were playing any other TW game, like Troy or Rome.

 

[Mitleser2020]

Try Better Shields & Missile Nerf and Various Battle Tweaks.
The former increases missile block chance of all shields by 15% and makes missile units noticeable less accurate, the latter increases the effectiveness of armor and will ensure that missile units will fire even if friendly units are in the path of their projectiles.

Thanks, but I was thinking maybe the Shogun 2 mod would be better. The thing with ranged in this game isn't only that ranged is extremely, grotesquely overpowered, it's also that most other units are useless. So the game needs a complete overhaul, not only a few % tweaks here and there. I recently skimmed through high elf and beastmen playthrough streams on legendary difficulty and both players had the exact same playstyle - 95% of the main army is ranged and consisting of mostly the same unit. When beastmen and high elves play exactly the same, there is a big problem somewhere. I honestly don't understand why people like this game so much and I don't know how streamers (or anyone else for that matter) that have played for 5k+ hours haven't burnt out during the first half of their second campaign.

My impression is that TWW2 remains so popular because there is so much official (DLCs) and unofficial (mods) additional content for the game.
Even if you only play high elves without paid DLC and mods, you can still get quite distinct campaigns from the start, see Eataine and Knights of Caledor.
That is why (unmoded) TWW aged much worse than its sequel.

 

[Lacrymas]

Even if you only play high elves without paid DLC and mods, you can still get quite distinct campaigns from the start, see Eataine and Knights of Caledor.

Can you? Here's an Imrik playthrough -

All archers yet again with the additional support of Imrik's dragon. I can type literally any LL in youtube and know exactly what army the player is playing with every time. The high elves have 31 units without counting heroes and LLs, yet all armies people play with look exactly the same, regardless of who you are playing as.

 

[Tyrr]

Watch Elich if you're looking for legendary playthroughs without cheesing. All Legend does is just cheesing the AI. I don't know why people want to watch that stuff.

On Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/elichtv
or YT: https://www.youtube.com/c/ElichTV/playlists

 

[Mitleser2020]

Even if you only play high elves without paid DLC and mods, you can still get quite distinct campaigns from the start, see Eataine and Knights of Caledor.

Can you? Here's an Imrik playthrough -

Yes, but that does not mean your early battles (when you can only recruit infantry) will be very distinct, especially if you play them on legendary difficulty (which discourages using melee infantry) as LegendofTotalWar does.
Aside from the starting units, the big difference between early high elf campaigns is their starting location and Imrik's is most isolated high elf one where you have to fight dwarfs, but won't trade with other factions and earn enough to afford a proper second army until much later.

 

[Lacrymas]

Watch Elich if you're looking for legendary playthroughs without cheesing. All Legend does is just cheesing the AI. I don't know why people want to watch that stuff.

On Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/elichtv
or YT: https://www.youtube.com/c/ElichTV/playlists

I clicked on a random video on a random timestamp with an army in it in his latest Tyrion playthrough and I got Alastar the White Lion with 3 melee units and 10 Sisters of Avelorn.

 

[Lacrymas]

Yes, but that does not mean your early battles (when you can only recruit infantry) will be very distinct, especially if you play them on legendary difficulty (which discourages using melee infantry) as LegendofTotalWar does.
Aside from the starting units, the big difference between early high elf campaigns is their starting location and Imrik's is most isolated high elf one where you have to fight dwarfs, but won't trade with other factions and earn enough to afford a proper second army until much later.

No problem, here's a random timestamp from much further into the campaign -

14 Sisters of Avelorn with 2 units of artillery. Higher difficulties discouraging the use of melee infantry is part of the problem. Difficulties also need an overhaul.

 

[Tyrr]

Watch Elich if you're looking for legendary playthroughs without cheesing. All Legend does is just cheesing the AI. I don't know why people want to watch that stuff.

On Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/elichtv
or YT: https://www.youtube.com/c/ElichTV/playlists

I clicked on a random video on a random timestamp with an army in it in his latest Tyrion playthrough and I got Alastar the White Lion with 3 melee units and 10 Sisters of Avelorn.

That's some bad luck. Try this. (Me also randomly searching for a battle in the same vid)

 

[Lacrymas]

That is slightly better, but it's still stacking 2 types of units with a rogue dragon out of 31 with one of them being ranged. Using just 10% of the roster is dubious at best, and he would get better results with more ranged either way but that's another issue.

 

[Tyrr]

Of course most HE armies will be somewhat range heavy.
Look for a Greenskin or Beastmen playthrough for more melee compositions.

edit: he plays Beastmen right now on Twitch.

 

[Mitleser2020]

14 Sisters of Avelorn with 2 units of artillery. Higher difficulties discouraging the use of melee infantry is part of the problem. Difficulties also need an overhaul.

Note that his main army at that time, Imrik's army is a dragon army without any missile units, not even a missile hero.
It does not have to be missile unit armies all the time, even if you play the range-focused high elves.
High elf armies centred around mages and single-entity monsters are also competitive.