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Yo cheeselord, what about an update to this tierlist with the addition of the special elector count unit variants. Some words about how do they hold up overall in the empire roster and how do they compare in cost effectiveness and usefulness with their vanilla counterparts.
Wow almost 2k hours in the game, and i didn't know about the 10-building rule. I was recently wondering why i could get SoA globally in 1 turn, and now i know it's cause spammed the handmaiden gallery building in that campaign
"There's no Steam sale" It would be rotten luck that the moment that comes up in prepping a video...they start a sale on TWW on Steam the evening before the video. Thats the sort of bad luck shit that'd happen to me if I were doing Legend's job too, lol.
yeah i recorded this a week ago and it took 5 days to get approval. I checked before making the video if there was a sale and there wasn't but by the time we published there was. You can see the date of the recording in the bottom right of the screen.
Huh... I didn't know about the global recruitment reduction every 10 buildings. I feel like I'm constantly learning new things about this game. Good tier list. I think this is the only faction so far that didn't have a single melee infantry unit above C tier.
If legend included the elector count units I guarantee we'd have seen eldred's guard at a tier. Those guys are so good and the carrouburg greats words would probably still be trash lol
Me neither. Guess it lends even more credence to focusing on certain buildings/units instead of a general mixed army. Getting dinos at 1 turn would be crazy
Yes. Also they can shoot while moving and shoot much faster then crossbows. Oh and the Anti-large helps a lot... You can melt mammoths and cavalry really fast, so if you are not completely overwhelmed, they can handle a lot of archer counter.
@@Debilinside My main issue with them is their loose formation and lack of armor piercing damage. So far I haven't encountered any situation where handgunners could not so the same or even a better job.
@@vahlen5281 Hadngunners are better in terms of dmg output, but much worse in utility. I think the loose formation is actually an upside as they are less vulnerable to AoE dmg and spells. But I might be wrong. I really dont like handgunners and gunpowder in general due the lack of arc.... If the terrain is not perfect they cant shoot half the battle. Also Huntsman have some AP dmg (I think around 8 at max without Wulfhart) which doesnt look like a lot, but actually quite enough in most cases as they shoot really fast compared to handgunners. But I think its not one is clearly better than the other, its more like how do you like to play and what do you value the most. If you go heavy heroes and tank with them handgunners are probably better.
@@Debilinside Loose formations would help against anything that covers a wide area. Volleys of projectiles like arrows in real life circumstances, but spells and such would be equally important in the game.
Pretty much. It's why I tend not to play them as the playstyle is based around just the heroes and lords eith skeleton meat shields. I can see why that would be appealing to some but as some1 who came from medieval 2 I like the lizardmen and greenskins moreso(also like playing ungrim/tyrion or markus wulfhart for alternate experiences), lizardmen as they have a lot of variety and the greenskins as the waagh mechanic reminds me of the jihad/crusade mechanic from medieval 2.
These tier lists are great. Would be cool to see a legendary lord ranking for all factions together in future! Or maybe videos discussing some suggested early/mid/late game army compositions for each faction
Something I will admit to being surprised about, after Legend covered Eltharion's special units, is the lack of the Empire's unique regional units - some are just base units with tweaked stats sure, but I recall there are a few that are entirely their own thing.
A single Reiksguard in Warhammer I get over 600 kills sometimes on Normal difficulty for me. It really shows how much not only the difficulty changes it, but also the power creep of Warhammer II
Pretty much all of the game 1 (and most of the game 3!) launch races need a boost to get on par with pretty much everything from 2. Elves are hands down one of the most powerful factions across the board, with wood elves being weaker on the campaign map but just as lethal on the battle field, skaven being insanely potent, and lizard men coming behind the rest but probably having the ability to field some of the strongest armies in the game period. The campaign mechanics of the other races are hit and miss vs how well they compare to those ones but on the battle field? it's not even a contest
I always enjoy a few tough cavalry units to go micromanage while waiting for the infantry Frontline to resolve. In Warhammer 2 and 3, I've had reiksgard still getting 200+ kills
Agreed on greatswords. The biggest thing that hurts them is no shield. They get shot to absolute pieces by any type of elf, but especially Dark elves which are pretty common by the mid to late game. Literally had one get half it's models taken out after being shot for a few seconds by a single shade unit.
Which is why I found them to be better in SFO than in Vanilla, they are still not gonna be your frontline killers as Melee Infantry isn't really the Empire's thing but because the Greatswords get as much Melee Defense as the Halbadiers they are way more useful as Blocking Units. (Plus the added Health in general)
Magic tier list would be pretty tricky to make because it highly depends on race: Light is pretty useless for Lizards but essential for HE, Fire is essential for Chaos and DE but for HE it's just ok, Heavens is mediocre for all races except Lizards etc
It's funny how much dread I felt when Legend said "This video is sponsered by..." and the wave of relief when he said "Instant Gaming" and not a certain infamous mobile game XD
Greatswords also have really bad tech and unit buffs, so you can't even turn their uninspiring statline into something valuable. Their MA/MD stats are uninspiring and you can't add to them except on the rank 7 redline buff.
They do have +10 anti infantry though. And that is added to MA vs enemy infantry. And they are fairly good at holding the line with high HP, high armor and high leadership. The last one is important as not running away is important when guarding archers.
I like to keep them as a second line unit, and throw them in wherever my frontline is getting wrecked because they can cleave through enemy armor really well. But I never have more than two great sword units in an army, they’re awful frontliners
@@M.J.D.R Maybe, but the point is, you can only have 20 squads in an army and if you want to bring two armies then that is an additional 15% (?) extra upkeep for every army due to supply lines. Great swords will still hold the line longer than spearmen against anything other than dedicated AP infantry. I have seen them get up to 145 armor without magic too. Which is great against missiles as those are mostly normal damage unless you are fighting dark elves. The AI is so bad with handgunners and positioning that I dont consider them much of a threat usually. Anyway, the point I wanted to make was that you can only put 20 squads in an army and a greatsword squad + a crossbow squad are a better investment that two spearman squads even if those spearmen will hold the line for longer. An extra Empire Captain would be even better of course, but those are limited recruitment.
I'd put Great Cannons at C-Tier at most because of their extremely low firing speed and their low firing arc. The only time they can do tons of damage is when firing into an infantry blob and hit 20+ models per shot, but Helstorm Rocket Batteries are overall a lot better against infantry and don't need a specific setup to perform well. When dealing with large enemies, Great Cannons can be quite finicky due to the terrain and if the enemy advances fast they only get off 2 or 3 shots because they fire so slowly. They are good at sieges, they do a lot of damage against walls and towers per shot and their low firing speed isn't hindering their performance, it's just annoying. Their high accuracy helps as well. However, the Empire is very strong at sieges anyways, especially their artillery, so using an artillery slot for a Great Cannon is just bad imo, you're almost always better off bringing a different artillery piece.
It depends, Helstorm are only good at the maximum unit size because their accuracy is simply terrible so when the enemy covers more terrain it doesn't matter if they miss that much, also the ap damage for the regular version is very low so against Chaos they are totally useless, even more than mortars. Against chaos I only bring cannons and hellblasters, cannons soft them up and hellblasters do the rest. I also put them at the front and side of the formation with some melee units as bait so when the enemy gets busy with the front line I flank with the artillery. It works pretty well. All considered the empire has pretty balanced artillery specialized for specifics jobs, it just so happens that the factions from the second game are seriously busted.
@@udozocklein6023 cannons are also cheap AF in upkeep, and are good for auto resolving sieges. They're great for a cheap army to quickly go grab a walled settlement
Im dissapointed with rockets because they miss a lot, hit own troops, useless if enemy is anywhere near your own troops, cant target single entities and are expensive af, useless at sieges .. very dissapointing and taking slots. One or two max will do some damage and thats it
For the greatsword, the greatsword "doomstack" video is further proof of their uselessness. It was obvious they would get wrecked because of AI cheat & stuff, but what was even more amazingly bad was the fact that they also did garbage damages. Like, they were buffed, (they were carroburg greatswords !!! who are on paper a huge improvement over classical greatswords), they had support from warrior priests, and yet not a single unit could do more than 4k damages. People always defend greatswords saying "it's a unit that needs support from other units", but they stay shit even with a shitload of buff. And in normal difficulty, they kind of work with all those buffs, but still get melted and are rarely worth it anyway. For an "Elite" unit, they have shit attack, shit defense and even shit damages (all their damages to infantry come from the bonus vs infantry, but a base 32 damages, even if it's armor piercing, is pretty low for a unit that also has low atk & defense). Just look at hammerers, executionners & stuff. They all are also shit tier in very hard battle difficulty, while having waaay more stats. How come empire greatswords can even work ? In the end, for a "lategame" frontline, i'll just build the armored spearmen of the Balthasar Gelt region combined with heroes.
I use my empire captains as literal meat shields alongside a battle priest for buffs, while a Life Wizard keeps them alive. The only infantry unit I might get are those shield spears just to hold the line for a bit.
All you need to know about Greatswords is that Wildwood Rangers, an anti-large unit of same tier and price, will beat the shit out of them on normal battle difficulty
@@1rb1s_ wild wood rangers aren’t anti large, they just have a buff that gives them like 8 bvl in forests, they are pretty much a wood elf equivalent gw infantry
Same as the Blackguard and Executioners for the Dark Elves, in The Empire Has No Chill video they got absolutely destroyed while the rest of the army walked away almost unscathed.
Thanks for finally covering the Empire! Only slightly disappointing thing is that it would've been great to see a breakdown of the Elector counts units (similar to the blessed spawnings for lizardmen) - some of the elector count state troops have some really interesting specific abilities and having a quick overview of them would've been great.
@@article1372 Exactly. I feel like Sootsuns mortars especially deserve some mention because they should never have to worry about using up all of their ammunition in a battle because of no friendly fire. They're not armor piercing but they can keep firing into a combat for the entire duration without fear of hurting your own troops and that's extremely powerful imo.
@@fish7598 the handgunners are also pretty good since they have more range and stalk. Eldreds guard are also really good, an even tankier spearmen with shields unit.
@@GeraltofRivia22 Not to mention the handgunners are much better in melee so they have just a bit more survivability if they get into combat, though that's probably not super useful on very hard battle difficulty.
Elector count units are expensive, but convenient to recruit in case of emergent situations, like, a 2nd line of Regiment of Renown. If anything, I feel the Spearman and Steam Tanks both perform the best.
Interesting... I was looking for a tier list of this faction LITERALLY just 4 days ago, and now it's here! Just started getting back to the Total War realm from being stuck in the unspeakable Fortnite world..... Thank you for the consistent content and superior videos, mate! Hope to see you live stream soon.
I've been really liking these videos. Here's a couple other ideas for the future, take it or leave it it's up to you just things have thought of. 1. Hero tier list comparing heroes from each faction 2. Lores of magic tier list. 3. Wind or vortex spell tier list. 4. All artilleries tier list comparing artillery from each faction.
These tier lists are quickly becoming my new favorite content from your channel. Plus there is a lot to go over. Might I recommend heroes, mages, and generic lords as well...
Really want to see the Beastmen one following their massive renewal patch, especially given what is worth spending on tier caps/building chains is a significant part of it.
Would really like to see something akin to a army composition guide. You mentioned some numbers but perhaps a more specific build with exact numbers of units you would recommend. I am certain it would be far more accurate and helpful than a certain Colonel’s TWW2 army guides😂
Personally I use 1 Lord, 1 Hero (one of these two is a caster), 4 Melee, 8 Ranged, 2 Artillery, 4 Misc. The Misc category is for Monsters, Cavalry, War Machines, or just buying extra Artillery/Ranged. Eg: DE army of XBow Lord, Sorc, 2 Blackguard, 2 Witch Elves, 8 Shades, 2 RBT, 2 Hydras, 2 Scourgerunners.
Depends on what factions you're interested in, but combined arms and a few well placed wind spells is a winning formula pretty much every time. Really it's just "play to the strengths of your faction".
I love Free Company Militia! While they don't have quite as much range as I'd like I love that they can fire a volley or two into approaching melee before they make contact to soften them up. I find that chips away at the enemy enough that the FCM can then come out on top, and then can fire while pursuing! Great early game unit. Also great for if the enemy doesn't engage the entirety of my line - I can swing the flanks out to blast into the sides of the enemy infantry.
I'm interested in vampire counts ranking. Will it be like this? Doomstack: skeleton warriors, skeleton spearmen A: empty B: empty C: empty Trash: all the other units xD
Once you get to tier4/5 with VC and the economy thrives you can make deadly doomstacks with terrorgheists and wraiths, even varghulfs are strong cause of regen. Direwolves and bats are pretty good early game units aswell. VC are much better than just skeletons+lord, but its super cheap and effective 4 surr
@@official_kden yeah I find that one or two units of direwolves are really good for racking up lots of kills at the end of a battle. And because of their high speed they're good at distracting slow deadly units away from your skeletons until they finish off everything else
Will there be any like Hero Tier list? I think heroes got a really important role in the game so I think they also need to be ranked. Would really appreciate it
@@aminerkin9844 Definitely not. HE Handmaidens and Nobles are not doomstacks. Same with DE Assassins or Masters. Or Skaven Warlock Engineers or Plague Priests or Assassins. Empire Witch Hunters and Dwarf Engineers also fall into this category.
@@Anand70707 No, you either can make a doomstack out of them or they are needed in your doomstack. In general, army buffing heroes and mages are the best, then heroes with great mounts can make great doomstack, but i can see why mount-less heroes that don't buff armies can be useless, but a lot of time, they buff your campaign. My point is that almost all the heroes are extremely useful and needed. You don't need to spam them, but all of them have an important function.
Yes! Finally! Also, I would love to maybe see a video explaining some of the nuances surrounding each faction. For example like Scrap and Oath gold are pretty straight forward but things like Snitch's contracts or the Empire's whole allegiance system are way beyond me. I'm just not sure what the best way to go about these races/factions are
To learn Sniktch's contracts. Try a Sniktch game while watching Legends playthrough at the same time. He gives slight explanations to the system whenever he uses it. Once you get later in the game it's more of a use it whenever you can thing. Also usually a test game is good for me. Going like 50-60 turns in to learn the ways a faction plays. Then starting over to do it all the best way you can.
A shame that greatswords don't perform well. I'm still going to recruit them because i like them thematically tho. Hope they get buffed in wh3 somehow.
If I'm honest, I'd just recommend not playing very hard. From what I've heard the buffs that A.I get makes it doomstack essential, which sounds relatively unappealing.
My usual imperial army is something like 6 - hellstorm 6 - gunners 4 - steam tanks the lord (possibly flying) life mage priest whatever hero (possibly a flying captain) maybe it's not a doomstack, meaning that it can struggle against more than two stacks, but it's very flexible. 6 hellstorms will shred any infrantry. 6 gunners will shred... well everything that comes into range actually. The 4 steam tanks are really good to protect the ranged castle. Because they are quite fast and very durable. It's just very difficult to bring down a steam tank while under fire by hellstorms and gunners. The flying heroes will patch the gaps and deal with the occasional enemy artillery. It's also good on sieges because almost everything either flies or have a gun. Plus it's not overly expensive since gunners are quite cheap and offset nicely the steam tanks. For example I think that this will have a much easier time against a rite of primeval glory army than a sister of averlon doomstack (even tough is a edge case)
I actually replace my mortars with wagon mortars after at a certain point. I don't know if it's my mods but for some reason, the artillery skill stacks with the wagon skills. Also, the added mobility is just a nice quality of life for battles.
I think it's worth noting the main drawback of less ammo is pretty much irrelevant in 90% of battles, and worst case scenario you can send them forward to get more shots off by the time the battle is over, and when they are out of ammo they can still run down the enemy, which is always valuable
This kind of stuff is so valuable for old WFB players like me. On the tabletop, swordsmen and knights were A tier. Spearmen and halberdiers were trash. Crossbowmen were rarely used, since their only advantage over handgunners was 6" of range. Hellstorms were far less reliable than other artillery (though people still used them for their damage output). There are other differences, but just the way the rules function as opposed to tabletop changes how useful units are.
Would love to see an updated list for Warhammer 3, playing as Volkmar on normal right now and the Empire knight unit he starts with have really helped a ton during the first 20 turns (I think their speed is 75 or 78 in Warhammer 3)
"The Empire has to deal with a lot of taint... but you don't have to struggle with your gross, hairy taint, because THIS VIDEO IS BROUGHT TO YOU BY MANSCAPED." Actually a big fan of the products, so I wish those stars would've aligned for this.
Always prioritize that which has the best killing potential/is the most risk to your win condition. Remember your goal is not to destroy their army, but to trigger Army Loss Penalties. Typically, you want to kill ranged units and SEMs first, because they're worth a lot of Balance of Power. After that you just grind all their infantry down and call it a win. Got an infantry army? Ace their artillery and wizards. Got a ranged army? Kill their fast movers and anything that outranges you. Monster spam? Be sure to kill their archers and gang pile their halberds.
I just started playing Warhammer Totak War 1 and this tier list is very detailed. Tha k you for making this video. Its still relevant today. I love the Helstorm Bartery and Mortar
Didn't know about the 10 Building Recruitment. Also, everytime I go into a Legend Tier List, I have to remember that he's doing Legendary and VH Battle, because I only play on Hard, and Greatswords eat up nearly anything they fight. Of course, it's clearly different when the enemy has like +15 Leadership, Melee Defence and Attack (not sure what the buff is, but it's absurd, I remember that)
does anyone else feel like how the game is balanced on higher difficulties is actually something of a major problem, because it makes a large part of every roster useless and trash tier regardless of how good their stats are or cheap they are
I have over 4k hours in the game and I never player anything above normal battle difficulty (campaign legendary is fine); this is because I like using variety and strategy in my armies. Hard, and especially very hard battle difficulties limits my choices and I always follow the same strats and army compositions. Melee becomes obsolete (just use heroes) and cavalry is an absolute joke. They "can" be made to work, but it's either situational or an extreme amount of prep is needed. On normal battle difficulty I can actually field Carrion as Tomb Kings and become the bane of any enemy artillery. I can actually use Reiksguard as the Empire with strategic purpose with flanking techniques and the "hammer and anvil". I am able to use Crypt Horrors to bolster my front line of skeletons as the Vampire Counts and cause havoc among my foes. All these things and much much more are aspects of the game that Legend hasn't experienced without frustration.
As someone who exclusively plays SFO, these unit tier lists really enlighten me as to why certain unit stats have been changed. SFO really helps with balancing and gives every unit a certain role. Far better than vanilla.
Loving these tier lists. A lot of the units fall into areas that make sense within their own tech line. Maybe 1 or 2 can go up or down depending on the LL in question but otherwise I can't argue with the efficiency aspect. That said making thematic armies on normal/hard difficulty is still fun!
@@ds22342 except that they can be stacked, my favourite is either emperors wrath doomstack or balanced stack of bordermen and gundersons surefires, though having stir river patrol as support unit seems interesting as they can suppress enemies, ofc hellstorms
They probably wouldn't do much to add to the units ranking even if they're a straight up upgrade, especially since you can only get them once every 10 or so turns and you need to get the electoral seats. Unlike Eltharions Mistwalkers that's different enough from other units and they're not as much of a hassle to recruit.
Dear Legend, i would love if u would include heroes in these roster tier rankings. Heroes are often essential for army compositions and it would be nice to know (mostly for new players) how their actual army should look with heroes
unfortunately at the time of recording which was like a week ago there was no steam sale. the unfortunate problem of having to wait for approval from the sponsor before publishing
Wow. . . I haven't played much empire, but comparing greatswords to Hellstorm Rocket Batteries is hilarious. They're both anti infantry, BUT THEY HAVE THE SAME COST! I never realized how expensive greatswords were. . .
I think greatswords (especially the elector count special variant) are minimum C tier when in Franz’s army since he has a few unique skill slots that apply to them such as “Emperor’s men”
Great video. Like High Elves though I feel like it doesn't really matter as if your playing Empire and worrying about individual units abilty your Empire-ing wrong. Whenever I play as Empire I play lore friendly armies and it makes the game 100x better. Watching swordsman hold the line in the late game hopelessly only to be saved by a reiksguard charge and Franz on deathclaw is what the warhammer fantasy battle franchise is all about!
One thing not mentioned about free company militia is that they're cavalry without cavalry when it comes to chasing units off to the shattered threshold. They can shoot on the move and are slightly faster than most empire units which you'll be facing as you start off vs empire secessionists and possibly Wissenland if you're aiming for its T3 helstorms. Against retreating units, they only need to shoot them a couple times on the chase and they're gonna be fully routed, meanwhile you either can't do that with spearmen or you're banking on your archers/starting crossbowmen/handgunner having enough of a window to deal enough damage before they're gone past the arc. Granted this isn't on legendary so it might not apply there in practice as stated in the video, I don't have that much fun on that mode to even think about it, but I also don't think that many people play on max difficulty either.
The only war wagon I like is the regiment that has the war wagon with the hell blaster cannon on it because since it’s elevated on the wagon it can shoot over the head of your infantry which is nice and it just shreds everything
Mortar war wagon is pretty good too. Its really useful if the AI decides to take a defensive position, since you really want the enemy coming to you if you're playing as the Empire. You can simply move it into range, fire a few shots and aggro the ai before quickly retreating, something you can't do with normal, slow artillery. Also decent for sniping enemy artillery.
The Luminark is the only unit I can think of that potentially breaks the CCCW Protocol IV (prohibiting "blinding laser weapons"). Not that it matters, because I highly doubt they had war laws in the World That Was, but still a neat fact.
FYI recently a bug regarding war wagons was confirmed that makes their missile damage almost half of what it is (not yet fixed). More info available at community bug fix mod discord.
Brettonian Tier list next please? That'd be interesting one I think. What are ostensibly "trash" units not being trash, and the WH2 trash units that are cavalry being all over the place in the tier. It'll be interesting to see how that mixes things up.
Outrider grenade launcher can be recruited as an elector unit. As you need 1-2/army max, you can actually reasonably recruit them as you go to your main armies. They are indeed very good, especially against greenskins and vamp counts. They can use a light wizard for the NoA to help out with some fast units, but can easily get 3-500 kills per battle and basically win the fight with some artillery support.
I've come up with an idea. At the end of each army roster tierlist video, why don't you share with us YOUR ideal army for that particular race? Not necessarily telling us to get those units, but you just share with us an optimal army that we can aim for when playing that race for the first time
@@dac314 not really because you can't have 19 hellstorms and call it a doomstack EVEN THOUGH they're doomstack worthy. So yeah, he can share with his viewers an optimal army
More or less yeah, basically standard units with one or two extra gimmicks. I do like a few of them like Marienburgs AP grenadiers, Gelts armoured spearmen, and Wissenlands Steam Tank. The slooow recruitment rate works against them though
@@spamquisition4046 So pointless of him to ignore them.. this is a tier list about campaign and he ignores campaign specific units you use HEAVILY when you play the faction.
I have to agree that ignoring them isn't great. They add a ton of flavour to the campaign but not all of them are worth recruiting beyond as extra 'code brown' emergency troops. I do quite like the Spearmen unit too. Silver shields! But the costs ramp up with too many of those units until you get the full discount from controlling all elector counts
"The empire has to deal with a lot of taint" -Legend. They sure do Legend, they sure do. Jokes aside, I was surprised to see so many melee infantry not in the trash tier. I'm very pleasantly surprised. Love these vids Legend!
Greatswords are good for one thing. Pushing into the breach of a walled settlement once you've used up your ammo and winds of magic when the enemy is still using low-tier units.
I one again ask you to please include heroes and their mounted variants. And Ogres too. Their usefulness only matters within each individual roster, and so these videos are the best place to discuss them. A mounted hero can turn a meh mount into something epic, or not much of a difference at all, so it does matter.
@@M.J.D.R I disagree. It's pointless to tier list heroes because their value is dependent on their roster. One hero in one list might be great, but if put in a comparison to another hero from another faction they could be garbage.
Free Company Militia are great for holding the flanks of a formation, or being a distraction vanguard force to delay the enemy, and give your artillery more time to fire. In particular, marching your fire-whilst-moving Free Company around the flanks to pressure away the enemy ranged units can be hilariously effective. 2 units of pistols chasing off hundreds and hundreds of goblins, gleefully shooting them in the back the entire time. And when the goblins route and shatter, come back and shoot the remaining boys and lads in the back. Really solid early to mid game strat.
Worth mentioning that your easiest access to grenade launchers is just to take Marienburg for access to The Bordermen state troop. And you always want Marienburg for that sweet, sweet port. Get that whole region and you get not just grenade launchers, but better grenade launchers that do AP damage. A couple of units of those babysitting a garrison is enough to hold off the worst norsca can throw at you, whether it's the scrum at the gates or a melee on the wall, they'll erase whatever they shoot at in a real hurry. On another note, surprised you didn't also cover the state troops, given that you covered 'special' units for the Helves.
Great point! I'm so dissapointed he didn't mention elector troops. Especially the grenade launchers, they are incredibly good in the early game and their AP allows them to stay useful.
FYI Legend rants against the very thing you’re suggesting in every empire stream he does. He recommends avoiding marienburg until very late, letting the ai develop it. In his words it’s a trap and causes more of a headache than it’s worth by bringing you into visibility of Norsca.
@@dudeofstuff That only works if Marienburg doesn't collapse like a twig. Rakarth, Brettonia, Norsca and the orcs can all take it or burn it to the ground. Moreover Marienburg is a great defensive point to defend vs all those threats because the legendary campaign AI can just avoid marienburg and attack Reikland directly. There are no natural borders to defend past Marienburg, while marienburg and the border fort can keep your entire Western flank secure.
@@tobiasL1991 I'm sorry but maybe watch the content of the guy you're on the channel arguing against the thing he suggests you do. with 12k hours of legendary campaign time
@@dudeofstuff That's just it, it's a suggestion, there's more than one way to play the game. Personally I prefer to take Marienburg immediately. I like Legend's content but I don't feel any need to worship him and copy everything he does. He enjoys the game his way, I enjoy it my way.
Man it's insane how the MP is diametrically opposite! Empire is BAD at anti-infantry to the point where Volkmar on his Altar becomes the linchpin of many builds to crush the enemy frontline. Empire Knights are probably the best roadblock unit in the game. KotB are a staple for many a match up where fire attacks are usefull. Flagellants are the unbreakable core for when you need your gunline covered.
It's weird because Greatswords are excellent in MP. They actually trade extremely well against most other infantry in the game, especially considered that they are relatively cheap as far as elite infantry goes. The problem with legendary battle difficult is that is artificially buffs the stats of enemy units, and this is especially noticeable in melee combat
That and the Greatswords are basically balanced for MP, they are just slightly worse than Infantry of the same teir in MP but because how Campign is set up in Very Hard and Legendary, that small gap quickly becomes a Giant Mountain for the Greatsword practically making them unviable in Vanilla, sometimes its so bad that they will break even before engaging in melee. (I see this problem mostly for the Empire and other generalist factions where they will begin to feel more range oriented as it goes on because of the Ai cheats, what was just marginally bad in Normal is amplified in Very Hard to the point it becomes useless.)
War Wagons can have their uses... Currently, I'll only ever want one to add mass to infantry in a breech or blob. Although, I would enjoy them with a kind of rattling gun suppression factor to combo with empire firepower, and add target ground for artillery variants.
Especially for Marcus, they have their uses early game. I think why most people don't like them so much is that they're DPS is so slow. Unless you are facing an army that doesn't have cavalry to run them down and you use them to skirmish The enemy before the main battle happens, what happens is that the rest of the battle is over far before they can do much damage.
I call them fat pistoliers. You put them in skirmish mode and use them as a distraction and lure enemy forces away. The benefit they offer is being tanky, and have a lot of ammo, so they can play the distraction game for a while. They can also be used to protect your mortar wagons
War Wagons should be T4 and be the Helblaster variant. Mortar Wagon should be T3. Both should be able to fire 360 on the move, but have less damage, less accuracy, less range etc. That should fix them.
@@ecargfosreya >Especially for Marcus, they have their uses early game. Well, any T3 unit must be good in early game if your lord starts with it :) IMO harassing with artillery or magic is way more efficient
13:45 yeah, of course the weapons team doomstack is way better than the dwarf organ gun-thunderer-ironbreaker doomstack. However, that is still the standard dwarf doomstack, and it should have been in the doomstack category. If you're only ranking one faction at a time, you should be ranking them based on comparisons to other units from that factions roster. Not to units from another faction.
The empire will have no trouble fighting a weapons team army, because hellstorm rockets are so good against them. My empire playthrough had the easiest time dealing with skaven than any other races.
Well, to be honest, they are just variants from already existing troops. They play the exact same role, except for only a few of them. Also keep in mind that they all cost 150-200 gold more to recruit than the regular version and their upkeep is also higher. So, basically, don't recruit them except for a few roles or when it's late in the campaign and you got tons of money. The only worthy units are (in my opinion): - Spearmen with charge defense versus all and a lot more armor - Handgunners with stalk and higher range - Mortars with slightly more damage without friendly fire - Steam tanks with better damage Sometimes you can also recruit Knights or Greatswords, but only one or two units of them, because of their hex and augments boosting your troops and lowering the ennemies'.
My first campaign ever in tw:wh was VC. On Normal/Normal i expanded west like a bushfire. In the western part of Averland and Stirland (both factions conquered) i encountered several armies of Reikland. Each fielding 4-6 units of outriders (and me having no idea what that unit could do) . Me only having skellies and lowlever heroes and lords. Boy was that impossible to deal with. Still remember these fights quite well. I somehow also managed to survive in the sense that my lords and heroes got away alive but not much else. So yeah. They are really amazing dealing with the counts, especially early-game.
I would say hellblasters are just handgunners on steroids. 3-4 of them could kill whatever left after 7-8 rockets fired at it. Good with dealing with charging giants and high tier meele cav. Especially with Gelt. Add mage and some tanks and some spearmen to protect em and you are good.
I know people are constantly throwing suggestions at you, but I bet people would love 5 minute quick start campaign guides. You could go over what LLS/lords/heroes are best, what are the best schools of magic, what buildings to build and what are some good armies in the early/middle/late game. These might be good TH-cam Shorts videos.
I dont like how the only knock on Reiksguard is the speed. They are a pretty powerful unit in melee and get some good bonuses from Franz. Maybe not as good as demi knights, but cheaper and higher entity count. I've had great success throwing a few of them in my army. I dont use them as traditional "shock cavalry" to cycle charge the enemy lines. But pinning flanks with the classic hammer anvil works wonders with them. Also, the outrider grenadier elector count unit is pretty insane lol
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Lmao did you ask them for the $13.13 price or was it that way on its own?
Can you get another sponsor for a Greenskin Unit Tier Ranking?
Yo cheeselord, what about an update to this tierlist with the addition of the special elector count unit variants. Some words about how do they hold up overall in the empire roster and how do they compare in cost effectiveness and usefulness with their vanilla counterparts.
@@YetiAY5000 i was thinking about doing the elector supply units but i'd just rank them the same as their regular counterparts
Huge sale on Steam atm, Warhammer 2 is £13.59 (Down from £39.99), unfortunate timing for this sponsor
Huntsmen can hide so well, that even Legend didn't notice them
they are actually amazing counter artillery unit, just hide it behind the enemy formation and snipe the artillery
@@lattekahvi1298 They are surely "Welcome to the wheat fields, motherfucker" type of unit who can shoot down cavalry unit enemy sends for them
@@lattekahvi1298 Do that with Shadow Walkers all the time.
This was good lol
Yup, they stalked all the way up to the end of the cavalry section. I was wondering when would Legend notice that he missed them.
important things I found out today:
1) you can decrease global recruitment duration by building 10 buildings of the same type
2) other stuff
3) You can increase global recruitment slots by building blacksmiths :o
@@AttiliusRex to be fair that's actually in the description of the building
@@anteep4900 i didnt understand what it meant until seeing this vid ::D
Playing total war since beginning and never know that, since I only build 1 or 2 military buildings of one kind xD
Wow almost 2k hours in the game, and i didn't know about the 10-building rule. I was recently wondering why i could get SoA globally in 1 turn, and now i know it's cause spammed the handmaiden gallery building in that campaign
so do we need 30 handmaiden gallery to reduce the recruitment duration of SoA to 1?
@@jeremytan739That or Tirion and Forest girl with the skill point that reduces global recruitment time.
@@ruukinen ha forest girl
About the same, man, CA is REALLY BAD at explaining their game mechanics XD
@@jeremytan739 or just have Ariel. She reduces recruitment by 1.
_"You can get Warhammer 1 for $13.13, which the Horned Rat 100% approves of."_
It truly is the year-time of the Great Horned Rat! Yes-yes!
I already had wh1, got it a number of years ago cheap after wh2 had been released.
Got wh2 the other week for about €14 on Kinguin.
"There's no Steam sale" It would be rotten luck that the moment that comes up in prepping a video...they start a sale on TWW on Steam the evening before the video. Thats the sort of bad luck shit that'd happen to me if I were doing Legend's job too, lol.
Ranald is with Leagend as always.
The sale is going on at least since yesterday...
There is no sale on Steam Tanks either, sadly. Where is that Steam tank meme boy when you need him?
yeah i recorded this a week ago and it took 5 days to get approval. I checked before making the video if there was a sale and there wasn't but by the time we published there was. You can see the date of the recording in the bottom right of the screen.
@@LegendofTotalWar What's the approval process you mentioned? I thought this was just record, edit, and upload
"The empire has to deal with a lot of taint" -LegendofTotalWar 2021
Ulric's taint to be specific.
Balthasar Gelt laughs in the distance: "I Am Supreme"
It's mostly Wurrzag's dancing.
I liked the pause before he said it, it feels like there was a small hesitation before he said it lol
I lold too
Huh... I didn't know about the global recruitment reduction every 10 buildings. I feel like I'm constantly learning new things about this game. Good tier list. I think this is the only faction so far that didn't have a single melee infantry unit above C tier.
If legend included the elector count units I guarantee we'd have seen eldred's guard at a tier. Those guys are so good and the carrouburg greats words would probably still be trash lol
That’s how we expect legend to treat melee infantry😂, unlike last week’s tier list where all the melee infantry avoided the “trash” tier.
Me neither. Guess it lends even more credence to focusing on certain buildings/units instead of a general mixed army. Getting dinos at 1 turn would be crazy
WHY DID NO ONE TELL ME THIS??? I always wondered why this happened mid-late game!
does it apply to all factions or just empire?
Huntsman stalk and snipe even legend missed them the first time
Yes. Also they can shoot while moving and shoot much faster then crossbows. Oh and the Anti-large helps a lot... You can melt mammoths and cavalry really fast, so if you are not completely overwhelmed, they can handle a lot of archer counter.
@@Debilinside My main issue with them is their loose formation and lack of armor piercing damage. So far I haven't encountered any situation where handgunners could not so the same or even a better job.
@@vahlen5281 Hadngunners are better in terms of dmg output, but much worse in utility. I think the loose formation is actually an upside as they are less vulnerable to AoE dmg and spells. But I might be wrong.
I really dont like handgunners and gunpowder in general due the lack of arc.... If the terrain is not perfect they cant shoot half the battle.
Also Huntsman have some AP dmg (I think around 8 at max without Wulfhart) which doesnt look like a lot, but actually quite enough in most cases as they shoot really fast compared to handgunners.
But I think its not one is clearly better than the other, its more like how do you like to play and what do you value the most. If you go heavy heroes and tank with them handgunners are probably better.
@@Debilinside Loose formations would help against anything that covers a wide area. Volleys of projectiles like arrows in real life circumstances, but spells and such would be equally important in the game.
Legendary comment.
Vampire counts tier list when? I want to see how Legend struggle to rate any units except skeletons higher than trash :)
Exactly my thoughts. It'll be one of the more interesting teir reviews.
Pretty much. It's why I tend not to play them as the playstyle is based around just the heroes and lords eith skeleton meat shields. I can see why that would be appealing to some but as some1 who came from medieval 2 I like the lizardmen and greenskins moreso(also like playing ungrim/tyrion or markus wulfhart for alternate experiences), lizardmen as they have a lot of variety and the greenskins as the waagh mechanic reminds me of the jihad/crusade mechanic from medieval 2.
@anime and furries belong in the trash ur profile name checks out
These tier lists are great. Would be cool to see a legendary lord ranking for all factions together in future! Or maybe videos discussing some suggested early/mid/late game army compositions for each faction
Legendary lords and heroes in a single list
@@AureliusAntoninusCaracalla I would say non legendary lords tier list, cuz LL are too crazy but common lords should be easier to place
@@szymonhutnik185 why not all lords and heroes in one tier list
Someone in the community could easily do that since he's given a 10 out of 10 rating for pretty much all the legendary Lords already
Legend already said Tretch, Khatep, Grimgor, Throgg and Luthor Harkon are his top 5 lords.
Something I will admit to being surprised about, after Legend covered Eltharion's special units, is the lack of the Empire's unique regional units - some are just base units with tweaked stats sure, but I recall there are a few that are entirely their own thing.
A single Reiksguard in Warhammer I get over 600 kills sometimes on Normal difficulty for me. It really shows how much not only the difficulty changes it, but also the power creep of Warhammer II
Pretty much all of the game 1 (and most of the game 3!) launch races need a boost to get on par with pretty much everything from 2. Elves are hands down one of the most powerful factions across the board, with wood elves being weaker on the campaign map but just as lethal on the battle field, skaven being insanely potent, and lizard men coming behind the rest but probably having the ability to field some of the strongest armies in the game period. The campaign mechanics of the other races are hit and miss vs how well they compare to those ones but on the battle field? it's not even a contest
@@fish7598 Unfortunately everything dies to the Knights of Tor Gaval without the knight stack losing a single unit.
@@fish7598 best CA can do is buff skaven even more.
Warhammer 1 has way better balancing for the most part.
I always enjoy a few tough cavalry units to go micromanage while waiting for the infantry Frontline to resolve. In Warhammer 2 and 3, I've had reiksgard still getting 200+ kills
Agreed on greatswords. The biggest thing that hurts them is no shield. They get shot to absolute pieces by any type of elf, but especially Dark elves which are pretty common by the mid to late game. Literally had one get half it's models taken out after being shot for a few seconds by a single shade unit.
Which is why I found them to be better in SFO than in Vanilla, they are still not gonna be your frontline killers as Melee Infantry isn't really the Empire's thing but because the Greatswords get as much Melee Defense as the Halbadiers they are way more useful as Blocking Units. (Plus the added Health in general)
I would love a Tomb Kings Tier List next, keep up the great videos!
Now the lists I would love to see, heroes, magic, and LL
A spell list tier would be pretty amazing. Flock of DOOOOOOM S++ tier for sure.
Yep he had a few "best 5 spells" or best 5 lores videos, but a) that's not comprehensive and b) it's all changed heavily since
He has done legendary lord lists for about half the races in the game. None for the empire yet though.
Magic tier list would be pretty tricky to make because it highly depends on race: Light is pretty useless for Lizards but essential for HE, Fire is essential for Chaos and DE but for HE it's just ok, Heavens is mediocre for all races except Lizards etc
It's funny how much dread I felt when Legend said "This video is sponsered by..." and the wave of relief when he said "Instant Gaming" and not a certain infamous mobile game XD
I waited for Manscape.
Dang, no Nordspace: Shadow Legends this time
He has stated he will never accept a sponsorship from someone he doesn't use, and he hates mobile games.
@@BenHyle See, I know that logically, but the Pavlovian response is still there XD
@@gaynorvaderable you right
Greatswords also have really bad tech and unit buffs, so you can't even turn their uninspiring statline into something valuable. Their MA/MD stats are uninspiring and you can't add to them except on the rank 7 redline buff.
They do have +10 anti infantry though. And that is added to MA vs enemy infantry. And they are fairly good at holding the line with high HP, high armor and high leadership. The last one is important as not running away is important when guarding archers.
I like to keep them as a second line unit, and throw them in wherever my frontline is getting wrecked because they can cleave through enemy armor really well. But I never have more than two great sword units in an army, they’re awful frontliners
@@deadlyydude5522 the very historical use of that unit.
@@chuckwood3426 base MA=32, plus 10 bonus against infantry makes it 42. Absolutely incompetent at legendary dif
@@M.J.D.R Maybe, but the point is, you can only have 20 squads in an army and if you want to bring two armies then that is an additional 15% (?) extra upkeep for every army due to supply lines. Great swords will still hold the line longer than spearmen against anything other than dedicated AP infantry. I have seen them get up to 145 armor without magic too. Which is great against missiles as those are mostly normal damage unless you are fighting dark elves. The AI is so bad with handgunners and positioning that I dont consider them much of a threat usually.
Anyway, the point I wanted to make was that you can only put 20 squads in an army and a greatsword squad + a crossbow squad are a better investment that two spearman squads even if those spearmen will hold the line for longer.
An extra Empire Captain would be even better of course, but those are limited recruitment.
I'd put Great Cannons at C-Tier at most because of their extremely low firing speed and their low firing arc. The only time they can do tons of damage is when firing into an infantry blob and hit 20+ models per shot, but Helstorm Rocket Batteries are overall a lot better against infantry and don't need a specific setup to perform well. When dealing with large enemies, Great Cannons can be quite finicky due to the terrain and if the enemy advances fast they only get off 2 or 3 shots because they fire so slowly. They are good at sieges, they do a lot of damage against walls and towers per shot and their low firing speed isn't hindering their performance, it's just annoying. Their high accuracy helps as well. However, the Empire is very strong at sieges anyways, especially their artillery, so using an artillery slot for a Great Cannon is just bad imo, you're almost always better off bringing a different artillery piece.
It depends, Helstorm are only good at the maximum unit size because their accuracy is simply terrible so when the enemy covers more terrain it doesn't matter if they miss that much, also the ap damage for the regular version is very low so against Chaos they are totally useless, even more than mortars. Against chaos I only bring cannons and hellblasters, cannons soft them up and hellblasters do the rest. I also put them at the front and side of the formation with some melee units as bait so when the enemy gets busy with the front line I flank with the artillery. It works pretty well.
All considered the empire has pretty balanced artillery specialized for specifics jobs, it just so happens that the factions from the second game are seriously busted.
i snipe lords with great cannons, they can hit even flying lords easily - very precise shots.
why bother attacking infantry with it?
@@udozocklein6023 cannons are also cheap AF in upkeep, and are good for auto resolving sieges. They're great for a cheap army to quickly go grab a walled settlement
@@CamoflaugeDinosaue yep, I like them a lot. Sure, they don't have the destructive power of helstorm... but they are not meant to.
Im dissapointed with rockets because they miss a lot, hit own troops, useless if enemy is anywhere near your own troops, cant target single entities and are expensive af, useless at sieges .. very dissapointing and taking slots. One or two max will do some damage and thats it
For the greatsword, the greatsword "doomstack" video is further proof of their uselessness. It was obvious they would get wrecked because of AI cheat & stuff, but what was even more amazingly bad was the fact that they also did garbage damages. Like, they were buffed, (they were carroburg greatswords !!! who are on paper a huge improvement over classical greatswords), they had support from warrior priests, and yet not a single unit could do more than 4k damages.
People always defend greatswords saying "it's a unit that needs support from other units", but they stay shit even with a shitload of buff. And in normal difficulty, they kind of work with all those buffs, but still get melted and are rarely worth it anyway.
For an "Elite" unit, they have shit attack, shit defense and even shit damages (all their damages to infantry come from the bonus vs infantry, but a base 32 damages, even if it's armor piercing, is pretty low for a unit that also has low atk & defense).
Just look at hammerers, executionners & stuff. They all are also shit tier in very hard battle difficulty, while having waaay more stats. How come empire greatswords can even work ?
In the end, for a "lategame" frontline, i'll just build the armored spearmen of the Balthasar Gelt region combined with heroes.
I use my empire captains as literal meat shields alongside a battle priest for buffs, while a Life Wizard keeps them alive. The only infantry unit I might get are those shield spears just to hold the line for a bit.
GS got 30 base MA. So you shouldn’t be surprised at all
All you need to know about Greatswords is that Wildwood Rangers, an anti-large unit of same tier and price, will beat the shit out of them on normal battle difficulty
@@1rb1s_ wild wood rangers aren’t anti large, they just have a buff that gives them like 8 bvl in forests, they are pretty much a wood elf equivalent gw infantry
Same as the Blackguard and Executioners for the Dark Elves, in The Empire Has No Chill video they got absolutely destroyed while the rest of the army walked away almost unscathed.
Thanks for finally covering the Empire! Only slightly disappointing thing is that it would've been great to see a breakdown of the Elector counts units (similar to the blessed spawnings for lizardmen) - some of the elector count state troops have some really interesting specific abilities and having a quick overview of them would've been great.
@@article1372 Exactly. I feel like Sootsuns mortars especially deserve some mention because they should never have to worry about using up all of their ammunition in a battle because of no friendly fire. They're not armor piercing but they can keep firing into a combat for the entire duration without fear of hurting your own troops and that's extremely powerful imo.
@@fish7598 the handgunners are also pretty good since they have more range and stalk. Eldreds guard are also really good, an even tankier spearmen with shields unit.
@@GeraltofRivia22 Not to mention the handgunners are much better in melee so they have just a bit more survivability if they get into combat, though that's probably not super useful on very hard battle difficulty.
Elector count units are expensive, but convenient to recruit in case of emergent situations, like, a 2nd line of Regiment of Renown.
If anything, I feel the Spearman and Steam Tanks both perform the best.
Interesting... I was looking for a tier list of this faction LITERALLY just 4 days ago, and now it's here! Just started getting back to the Total War realm from being stuck in the unspeakable Fortnite world..... Thank you for the consistent content and superior videos, mate! Hope to see you live stream soon.
I've been really liking these videos. Here's a couple other ideas for the future, take it or leave it it's up to you just things have thought of.
1. Hero tier list comparing heroes from each faction
2. Lores of magic tier list.
3. Wind or vortex spell tier list.
4. All artilleries tier list comparing artillery from each faction.
These tier lists are quickly becoming my new favorite content from your channel. Plus there is a lot to go over. Might I recommend heroes, mages, and generic lords as well...
Really want to see the Beastmen one following their massive renewal patch, especially given what is worth spending on tier caps/building chains is a significant part of it.
The fact that Greatswords are trash makes the fact you get foot Reiksguard in the SFO mod with swords and Shields that much more gratifying.
Plenty of other mods give elite infantry with shields, usually with 100 model units. Definitely better than greatswords.
Would really like to see something akin to a army composition guide. You mentioned some numbers but perhaps a more specific build with exact numbers of units you would recommend. I am certain it would be far more accurate and helpful than a certain Colonel’s TWW2 army guides😂
Yeah maybe when he's done with the tier list videos he could do a army composition guide for each faction for early mid and late game
Just search his past streams. you find there all you need.
Personally I use 1 Lord, 1 Hero (one of these two is a caster), 4 Melee, 8 Ranged, 2 Artillery, 4 Misc. The Misc category is for Monsters, Cavalry, War Machines, or just buying extra Artillery/Ranged.
Eg: DE army of XBow Lord, Sorc, 2 Blackguard, 2 Witch Elves, 8 Shades, 2 RBT, 2 Hydras, 2 Scourgerunners.
@@OniGanon Empire needs at least 4 artillery. Anything else is sub-optimal
Depends on what factions you're interested in, but combined arms and a few well placed wind spells is a winning formula pretty much every time. Really it's just "play to the strengths of your faction".
Can’t wait for the updated tier list!
I love Free Company Militia! While they don't have quite as much range as I'd like I love that they can fire a volley or two into approaching melee before they make contact to soften them up. I find that chips away at the enemy enough that the FCM can then come out on top, and then can fire while pursuing! Great early game unit. Also great for if the enemy doesn't engage the entirety of my line - I can swing the flanks out to blast into the sides of the enemy infantry.
I'm interested in vampire counts ranking. Will it be like this?
Doomstack: skeleton warriors, skeleton spearmen
A: empty
B: empty
C: empty
Trash: all the other units xD
no, skeleton warriors should be A tier
Once you get to tier4/5 with VC and the economy thrives you can make deadly doomstacks with terrorgheists and wraiths, even varghulfs are strong cause of regen. Direwolves and bats are pretty good early game units aswell. VC are much better than just skeletons+lord, but its super cheap and effective 4 surr
Hey, don't forget about the vargulfs for siege attack.
@@official_kden yeah I find that one or two units of direwolves are really good for racking up lots of kills at the end of a battle. And because of their high speed they're good at distracting slow deadly units away from your skeletons until they finish off everything else
I'm not necessarily saying that it would be my ranking but more like a ranking Legend would make
Will there be any like Hero Tier list?
I think heroes got a really important role in the game so I think they also need to be ranked. Would really appreciate it
Almost all of them are doomstack
@@aminerkin9844 Definitely not. HE Handmaidens and Nobles are not doomstacks. Same with DE Assassins or Masters. Or Skaven Warlock Engineers or Plague Priests or Assassins. Empire Witch Hunters and Dwarf Engineers also fall into this category.
@@Anand70707 No, you either can make a doomstack out of them or they are needed in your doomstack.
In general, army buffing heroes and mages are the best, then heroes with great mounts can make great doomstack, but i can see why mount-less heroes that don't buff armies can be useless, but a lot of time, they buff your campaign.
My point is that almost all the heroes are extremely useful and needed.
You don't need to spam them, but all of them have an important function.
@@Anand70707 HE nobles are definitely doomstacks. Just look it up, Legend has a video on them
Imagine an Exalted Heroes doomstack with Infernal dominance trait...
Yes! Finally!
Also, I would love to maybe see a video explaining some of the nuances surrounding each faction. For example like Scrap and Oath gold are pretty straight forward but things like Snitch's contracts or the Empire's whole allegiance system are way beyond me. I'm just not sure what the best way to go about these races/factions are
To learn Sniktch's contracts. Try a Sniktch game while watching Legends playthrough at the same time. He gives slight explanations to the system whenever he uses it. Once you get later in the game it's more of a use it whenever you can thing.
Also usually a test game is good for me. Going like 50-60 turns in to learn the ways a faction plays. Then starting over to do it all the best way you can.
A shame that greatswords don't perform well. I'm still going to recruit them because i like them thematically tho. Hope they get buffed in wh3 somehow.
I'm sure there is a mod on the workshop that can buff them a bit
If I'm honest, I'd just recommend not playing very hard. From what I've heard the buffs that A.I get makes it doomstack essential, which sounds relatively unappealing.
@@tallymanz6756 not like Greatswords are particularly good on normal
Lots of respect for pistoliers because they saved my ass in a pretty hopeless battle by soloing a big chunk of a VC army
Dahv approves
Except the ai loves dire wolves and fell bats, both hard counters to pistoliers.
My usual imperial army is something like
6 - hellstorm
6 - gunners
4 - steam tanks
the lord (possibly flying)
life mage
priest
whatever hero (possibly a flying captain)
maybe it's not a doomstack, meaning that it can struggle against more than two stacks, but it's very flexible. 6 hellstorms will shred any infrantry. 6 gunners will shred... well everything that comes into range actually. The 4 steam tanks are really good to protect the ranged castle. Because they are quite fast and very durable. It's just very difficult to bring down a steam tank while under fire by hellstorms and gunners. The flying heroes will patch the gaps and deal with the occasional enemy artillery. It's also good on sieges because almost everything either flies or have a gun. Plus it's not overly expensive since gunners are quite cheap and offset nicely the steam tanks.
For example I think that this will have a much easier time against a rite of primeval glory army than a sister of averlon doomstack (even tough is a edge case)
I actually replace my mortars with wagon mortars after at a certain point.
I don't know if it's my mods but for some reason, the artillery skill stacks with the wagon skills. Also, the added mobility is just a nice quality of life for battles.
I think it's worth noting the main drawback of less ammo is pretty much irrelevant in 90% of battles, and worst case scenario you can send them forward to get more shots off by the time the battle is over, and when they are out of ammo they can still run down the enemy, which is always valuable
This kind of stuff is so valuable for old WFB players like me. On the tabletop, swordsmen and knights were A tier. Spearmen and halberdiers were trash. Crossbowmen were rarely used, since their only advantage over handgunners was 6" of range. Hellstorms were far less reliable than other artillery (though people still used them for their damage output). There are other differences, but just the way the rules function as opposed to tabletop changes how useful units are.
Would love to see an updated list for Warhammer 3, playing as Volkmar on normal right now and the Empire knight unit he starts with have really helped a ton during the first 20 turns (I think their speed is 75 or 78 in Warhammer 3)
Normal campaign, hard battles with no AI buffs
"The Empire has to deal with a lot of taint... but you don't have to struggle with your gross, hairy taint, because THIS VIDEO IS BROUGHT TO YOU BY MANSCAPED." Actually a big fan of the products, so I wish those stars would've aligned for this.
It would be nice to get to know these faction tier list from AI perspective as well - what to prioritize in battle, what to avoid etc
Always prioritize that which has the best killing potential/is the most risk to your win condition. Remember your goal is not to destroy their army, but to trigger Army Loss Penalties. Typically, you want to kill ranged units and SEMs first, because they're worth a lot of Balance of Power. After that you just grind all their infantry down and call it a win.
Got an infantry army? Ace their artillery and wizards.
Got a ranged army? Kill their fast movers and anything that outranges you.
Monster spam? Be sure to kill their archers and gang pile their halberds.
I just started playing Warhammer Totak War 1 and this tier list is very detailed. Tha k you for making this video. Its still relevant today. I love the Helstorm Bartery and Mortar
Didn't know about the 10 Building Recruitment.
Also, everytime I go into a Legend Tier List, I have to remember that he's doing Legendary and VH Battle, because I only play on Hard, and Greatswords eat up nearly anything they fight. Of course, it's clearly different when the enemy has like +15 Leadership, Melee Defence and Attack (not sure what the buff is, but it's absurd, I remember that)
Greatswords still kinda suck even on normal. They get shot to pieces and get wrecked by monsters.
Thanks Legend I’m an empire main so appreciated your input on the troops
does anyone else feel like how the game is balanced on higher difficulties is actually something of a major problem, because it makes a large part of every roster useless and trash tier regardless of how good their stats are or cheap they are
I have over 4k hours in the game and I never player anything above normal battle difficulty (campaign legendary is fine); this is because I like using variety and strategy in my armies. Hard, and especially very hard battle difficulties limits my choices and I always follow the same strats and army compositions. Melee becomes obsolete (just use heroes) and cavalry is an absolute joke.
They "can" be made to work, but it's either situational or an extreme amount of prep is needed. On normal battle difficulty I can actually field Carrion as Tomb Kings and become the bane of any enemy artillery. I can actually use Reiksguard as the Empire with strategic purpose with flanking techniques and the "hammer and anvil". I am able to use Crypt Horrors to bolster my front line of skeletons as the Vampire Counts and cause havoc among my foes.
All these things and much much more are aspects of the game that Legend hasn't experienced without frustration.
That's why normal exists. The game isnt built around very hard difficulty
@@danieltadd agreed although I do typically play campaign on normal as well just because public order annoys the shit out of me with certain factions
@@SovietRussia777 there are plenty of mods which remove public order penalties from the difficulties tbf
As someone who exclusively plays SFO, these unit tier lists really enlighten me as to why certain unit stats have been changed. SFO really helps with balancing and gives every unit a certain role. Far better than vanilla.
SFO War Wagons are great because of ammo replenish
lol sfo and balance in the same sentence, people are truly delusional
Loving these tier lists. A lot of the units fall into areas that make sense within their own tech line. Maybe 1 or 2 can go up or down depending on the LL in question but otherwise I can't argue with the efficiency aspect. That said making thematic armies on normal/hard difficulty is still fun!
Staunch line of spears!
Great list Legend! I wouldnt mind seeing orc tier list next.
No Elector Count units? Probably not highly-ranked for the most part, but still curious
They are like regiments of renown.
@@ds22342 Legend covered blessed spawning's which are less accessible to recruit, so no, they're not.
@@ds22342 except that they can be stacked, my favourite is either emperors wrath doomstack or balanced stack of bordermen and gundersons surefires, though having stir river patrol as support unit seems interesting as they can suppress enemies, ofc hellstorms
I was wondering this too.
They probably wouldn't do much to add to the units ranking even if they're a straight up upgrade, especially since you can only get them once every 10 or so turns and you need to get the electoral seats. Unlike Eltharions Mistwalkers that's different enough from other units and they're not as much of a hassle to recruit.
Dear Legend, i would love if u would include heroes in these roster tier rankings. Heroes are often essential for army compositions and it would be nice to know (mostly for new players) how their actual army should look with heroes
“There’s no steam sale on at the moment”
Who wants to tell him
unfortunately at the time of recording which was like a week ago there was no steam sale. the unfortunate problem of having to wait for approval from the sponsor before publishing
@@LegendofTotalWar feels bad, thanks for the tier list anyway, it’s helping my figure out which empire DLCs to get first
Love this series. Tiers are a great way to explain and compare units. I appreciate you sharing your knowledge.
"If you build 10 buildings of the same recruitment, you gmcan reduce the recruitment time by 1" - legendoftotal war
Legendary information
I had no idea about the 10 buildings thing :0
thank you legend this is gonna be really helpful :)
Vampire Count tier list next please!
...and maybe when you've finished these tier lists, you could rate heroes for every faction!
And Vampirates
I’d honestly argue that the Empire has one of the best building tree layouts in the game, or better put best designed.
I'd say there are people, who just don't like having to build 2 buildings to unlock a certain unit. To me it just feels bad.
"The empire has to deal with quite a lot of taint" Slaanesh approved
12:57 The Gunner unit is actually playing guitar and their awesome riffs are keeping the battle alive.
Wow. . . I haven't played much empire, but comparing greatswords to Hellstorm Rocket Batteries is hilarious. They're both anti infantry, BUT THEY HAVE THE SAME COST! I never realized how expensive greatswords were. . .
I think greatswords (especially the elector count special variant) are minimum C tier when in Franz’s army since he has a few unique skill slots that apply to them such as “Emperor’s men”
Love theese kinds of videos legend! keep them coming!
Going from Reiksguard to Demigryphs is night and day, it blew my mind when I first tried them.
Great video. Like High Elves though I feel like it doesn't really matter as if your playing Empire and worrying about individual units abilty your Empire-ing wrong. Whenever I play as Empire I play lore friendly armies and it makes the game 100x better. Watching swordsman hold the line in the late game hopelessly only to be saved by a reiksguard charge and Franz on deathclaw is what the warhammer fantasy battle franchise is all about!
One thing not mentioned about free company militia is that they're cavalry without cavalry when it comes to chasing units off to the shattered threshold. They can shoot on the move and are slightly faster than most empire units which you'll be facing as you start off vs empire secessionists and possibly Wissenland if you're aiming for its T3 helstorms. Against retreating units, they only need to shoot them a couple times on the chase and they're gonna be fully routed, meanwhile you either can't do that with spearmen or you're banking on your archers/starting crossbowmen/handgunner having enough of a window to deal enough damage before they're gone past the arc. Granted this isn't on legendary so it might not apply there in practice as stated in the video, I don't have that much fun on that mode to even think about it, but I also don't think that many people play on max difficulty either.
The only war wagon I like is the regiment that has the war wagon with the hell blaster cannon on it because since it’s elevated on the wagon it can shoot over the head of your infantry which is nice and it just shreds everything
Mortar war wagon is pretty good too. Its really useful if the AI decides to take a defensive position, since you really want the enemy coming to you if you're playing as the Empire. You can simply move it into range, fire a few shots and aggro the ai before quickly retreating, something you can't do with normal, slow artillery. Also decent for sniping enemy artillery.
The Luminark is the only unit I can think of that potentially breaks the CCCW Protocol IV (prohibiting "blinding laser weapons"). Not that it matters, because I highly doubt they had war laws in the World That Was, but still a neat fact.
I didn't know, that if you build 10 recruitments building, it would reduce the global recruitment time by 1. And I've played the game for hours
FYI recently a bug regarding war wagons was confirmed that makes their missile damage almost half of what it is (not yet fixed).
More info available at community bug fix mod discord.
The empire is really strong, but kinda underestimated by meme. They have the supreme firepower like skaven, but are more anti-infantry than anti-large
Brettonian Tier list next please? That'd be interesting one I think. What are ostensibly "trash" units not being trash, and the WH2 trash units that are cavalry being all over the place in the tier. It'll be interesting to see how that mixes things up.
Could you do Vampire Counts next? Their tier list would be very interesting.
Zombies = doomstack
@@michaelpetrovich5353 correct answer is skellyboys.
a video showing us what armies are best for each race would be helpful!
Outrider grenade launcher can be recruited as an elector unit. As you need 1-2/army max, you can actually reasonably recruit them as you go to your main armies. They are indeed very good, especially against greenskins and vamp counts. They can use a light wizard for the NoA to help out with some fast units, but can easily get 3-500 kills per battle and basically win the fight with some artillery support.
Yes, finally faith, steel and gunpowder!!
And boredom! Lots, lots of boredom.
@@giantmagicalduck3604 nope
Love my grenadiers, never more than 2 though, 1 will always do work if you can get it on a priority target.
I've come up with an idea. At the end of each army roster tierlist video, why don't you share with us YOUR ideal army for that particular race? Not necessarily telling us to get those units, but you just share with us an optimal army that we can aim for when playing that race for the first time
Unfortunately Legend would just say "doomstack this unit".
@@dac314 not really because you can't have 19 hellstorms and call it a doomstack EVEN THOUGH they're doomstack worthy. So yeah, he can share with his viewers an optimal army
30:40 he says his ideal army comp:
5-10 Hellstorms
And the rest of the army heroes and holding units to support the artillery
@@dac314 hellstorms were just an example. Im talking about all the races in general
BRUH. Who cares about army, just get some rangeds and cheese away.
Damn that tip on Instant Gaming for the discounted Warhammer III was awesome.
Did Legend say he wasn't covering the Elector Count State Troops in this tier list? They are almost normal units in the campaign right?
More or less yeah, basically standard units with one or two extra gimmicks. I do like a few of them like Marienburgs AP grenadiers, Gelts armoured spearmen, and Wissenlands Steam Tank. The slooow recruitment rate works against them though
@@spamquisition4046 So pointless of him to ignore them.. this is a tier list about campaign and he ignores campaign specific units you use HEAVILY when you play the faction.
I have to agree that ignoring them isn't great. They add a ton of flavour to the campaign but not all of them are worth recruiting beyond as extra 'code brown' emergency troops.
I do quite like the Spearmen unit too. Silver shields! But the costs ramp up with too many of those units until you get the full discount from controlling all elector counts
Hoping for an updated tierlist after Thrones of Decay🤞🏻
"The empire has to deal with a lot of taint" -Legend.
They sure do Legend, they sure do.
Jokes aside, I was surprised to see so many melee infantry not in the trash tier. I'm very pleasantly surprised. Love these vids Legend!
Greatswords are good for one thing. Pushing into the breach of a walled settlement once you've used up your ammo and winds of magic when the enemy is still using low-tier units.
I one again ask you to please include heroes and their mounted variants. And Ogres too. Their usefulness only matters within each individual roster, and so these videos are the best place to discuss them. A mounted hero can turn a meh mount into something epic, or not much of a difference at all, so it does matter.
It can be done apart, in a hero rating video
@@M.J.D.R I disagree. It's pointless to tier list heroes because their value is dependent on their roster. One hero in one list might be great, but if put in a comparison to another hero from another faction they could be garbage.
Free Company Militia are great for holding the flanks of a formation, or being a distraction vanguard force to delay the enemy, and give your artillery more time to fire.
In particular, marching your fire-whilst-moving Free Company around the flanks to pressure away the enemy ranged units can be hilariously effective. 2 units of pistols chasing off hundreds and hundreds of goblins, gleefully shooting them in the back the entire time. And when the goblins route and shatter, come back and shoot the remaining boys and lads in the back. Really solid early to mid game strat.
Worth mentioning that your easiest access to grenade launchers is just to take Marienburg for access to The Bordermen state troop. And you always want Marienburg for that sweet, sweet port. Get that whole region and you get not just grenade launchers, but better grenade launchers that do AP damage. A couple of units of those babysitting a garrison is enough to hold off the worst norsca can throw at you, whether it's the scrum at the gates or a melee on the wall, they'll erase whatever they shoot at in a real hurry.
On another note, surprised you didn't also cover the state troops, given that you covered 'special' units for the Helves.
Great point!
I'm so dissapointed he didn't mention elector troops. Especially the grenade launchers, they are incredibly good in the early game and their AP allows them to stay useful.
FYI Legend rants against the very thing you’re suggesting in every empire stream he does. He recommends avoiding marienburg until very late, letting the ai develop it. In his words it’s a trap and causes more of a headache than it’s worth by bringing you into visibility of Norsca.
@@dudeofstuff That only works if Marienburg doesn't collapse like a twig.
Rakarth, Brettonia, Norsca and the orcs can all take it or burn it to the ground.
Moreover Marienburg is a great defensive point to defend vs all those threats because the legendary campaign AI can just avoid marienburg and attack Reikland directly.
There are no natural borders to defend past Marienburg, while marienburg and the border fort can keep your entire Western flank secure.
@@tobiasL1991 I'm sorry but maybe watch the content of the guy you're on the channel arguing against the thing he suggests you do. with 12k hours of legendary campaign time
@@dudeofstuff That's just it, it's a suggestion, there's more than one way to play the game. Personally I prefer to take Marienburg immediately. I like Legend's content but I don't feel any need to worship him and copy everything he does. He enjoys the game his way, I enjoy it my way.
"Because VC's can't fire back" Man that sentence hurt many people here personally I bet. OOF.
Man it's insane how the MP is diametrically opposite!
Empire is BAD at anti-infantry to the point where Volkmar on his Altar becomes the linchpin of many builds to crush the enemy frontline.
Empire Knights are probably the best roadblock unit in the game. KotB are a staple for many a match up where fire attacks are usefull. Flagellants are the unbreakable core for when you need your gunline covered.
It's weird because Greatswords are excellent in MP. They actually trade extremely well against most other infantry in the game, especially considered that they are relatively cheap as far as elite infantry goes. The problem with legendary battle difficult is that is artificially buffs the stats of enemy units, and this is especially noticeable in melee combat
That and the Greatswords are basically balanced for MP, they are just slightly worse than Infantry of the same teir in MP but because how Campign is set up in Very Hard and Legendary, that small gap quickly becomes a Giant Mountain for the Greatsword practically making them unviable in Vanilla, sometimes its so bad that they will break even before engaging in melee. (I see this problem mostly for the Empire and other generalist factions where they will begin to feel more range oriented as it goes on because of the Ai cheats, what was just marginally bad in Normal is amplified in Very Hard to the point it becomes useless.)
I really like war wagon mortars because of how much more tanky and mobile they are than regular mortars even if their range is a bit lower
Nice, I love instant and I love your content, great work as always!
War Wagons can have their uses... Currently, I'll only ever want one to add mass to infantry in a breech or blob. Although, I would enjoy them with a kind of rattling gun suppression factor to combo with empire firepower, and add target ground for artillery variants.
Especially for Marcus, they have their uses early game. I think why most people don't like them so much is that they're DPS is so slow. Unless you are facing an army that doesn't have cavalry to run them down and you use them to skirmish The enemy before the main battle happens, what happens is that the rest of the battle is over far before they can do much damage.
I call them fat pistoliers. You put them in skirmish mode and use them as a distraction and lure enemy forces away. The benefit they offer is being tanky, and have a lot of ammo, so they can play the distraction game for a while. They can also be used to protect your mortar wagons
War Wagons should be T4 and be the Helblaster variant. Mortar Wagon should be T3. Both should be able to fire 360 on the move, but have less damage, less accuracy, less range etc. That should fix them.
@@ecargfosreya >Especially for Marcus, they have their uses early game.
Well, any T3 unit must be good in early game if your lord starts with it :) IMO harassing with artillery or magic is way more efficient
Totally agree with your rankings, I hope you do the Tomb Kings soon. Thanks for the education!
13:45 yeah, of course the weapons team doomstack is way better than the dwarf organ gun-thunderer-ironbreaker doomstack. However, that is still the standard dwarf doomstack, and it should have been in the doomstack category. If you're only ranking one faction at a time, you should be ranking them based on comparisons to other units from that factions roster. Not to units from another faction.
The empire will have no trouble fighting a weapons team army, because hellstorm rockets are so good against them. My empire playthrough had the easiest time dealing with skaven than any other races.
@@gustafmannerheim9720 the AI doesnt build weapons team doomstacks though, and it sure as hell doesn't know how to use them.
Much love for making this mate!
I feel like including all the Elector Count Troops would have been helpful.
Treat them like blessed lizard units
Well, to be honest, they are just variants from already existing troops. They play the exact same role, except for only a few of them. Also keep in mind that they all cost 150-200 gold more to recruit than the regular version and their upkeep is also higher. So, basically, don't recruit them except for a few roles or when it's late in the campaign and you got tons of money.
The only worthy units are (in my opinion):
- Spearmen with charge defense versus all and a lot more armor
- Handgunners with stalk and higher range
- Mortars with slightly more damage without friendly fire
- Steam tanks with better damage
Sometimes you can also recruit Knights or Greatswords, but only one or two units of them, because of their hex and augments boosting your troops and lowering the ennemies'.
Hey thanks for the video, and the reminder about instant-gaming. I picked up the only Stellaris DLC that hasnt gone on sale yet.
My first campaign ever in tw:wh was VC. On Normal/Normal i expanded west like a bushfire. In the western part of Averland and Stirland (both factions conquered) i encountered several armies of Reikland. Each fielding 4-6 units of outriders (and me having no idea what that unit could do) . Me only having skellies and lowlever heroes and lords. Boy was that impossible to deal with. Still remember these fights quite well. I somehow also managed to survive in the sense that my lords and heroes got away alive but not much else. So yeah. They are really amazing dealing with the counts, especially early-game.
I would say hellblasters are just handgunners on steroids. 3-4 of them could kill whatever left after 7-8 rockets fired at it. Good with dealing with charging giants and high tier meele cav. Especially with Gelt. Add mage and some tanks and some spearmen to protect em and you are good.
I know people are constantly throwing suggestions at you, but I bet people would love 5 minute quick start campaign guides. You could go over what LLS/lords/heroes are best, what are the best schools of magic, what buildings to build and what are some good armies in the early/middle/late game. These might be good TH-cam Shorts videos.
I dont like how the only knock on Reiksguard is the speed. They are a pretty powerful unit in melee and get some good bonuses from Franz. Maybe not as good as demi knights, but cheaper and higher entity count. I've had great success throwing a few of them in my army. I dont use them as traditional "shock cavalry" to cycle charge the enemy lines. But pinning flanks with the classic hammer anvil works wonders with them.
Also, the outrider grenadier elector count unit is pretty insane lol
I think it got better in wh3
Nothing quite like playing Empire and the Hammer Time song kicks in.
Another great list, thank you.