I really like the dwarf roster, because it has such a solid core of tank and gun powder DPS and artillery. The roster inherently doesn't need a lot of micro but really rewards the use of a single specialized unit such as the iron Drake for infantry clearing or a gyrocopter for counter artillery
I think their roster is awful, they have no solution to deal with long range artillery outside of grudge throwers, iron breakers melt like snow,and get tossed around left rigth and center by anything with some armor piercing and mass, thunderers shoot their front line in the back everytime you fight uphill,Heroes and lords have no mounts, they cant flank...the only good thing about dwarves is they have excellent auto resolve i ve got heroic victories attacking cities with a mid tier full stack in them in very hard difficulty ... They desesperatly need some cavalry units mounted on rams equivalent to Khorne juggernauts limited speed but lot of mass with anti infantry, shield and armor piercing To me they are the weakest race on the battle field after Cathay and Bretonnia
@@calgar42k Gyrocopters are the solution to long range artillery. They're incredibly op against the AI forces. Start them on the flanks and send them out, swoop them around the back of the enemy army and just nuke the unit. Iron Breakers have extreme amounts of melee defence and will still hold far longer than any other infantry in the game. AP doesn't matter when they can parry most of the attacks coming their way, I don't know where you're seeing Ironbreakers being melted. Is mass an issue? Probably monsters - send thunderers their way and it's sorted. Heroes don't need mounts. They're one-man line holders. You don't need to flank as Dwarfs, if you learn how to properly utilize gunpowder formations, you have plenty of openings for your ranged units to fire in on the enemy once the line clash. If you seriously need hammers for your anvil, Slayers and Hammerers are fine for that. Not necessary otherwise. Your problem with Thunderers can be applied to any gunpowder unit. In all of my legendary campaigns I've played from WH1 to WH3 as Dwarfs, I have rarely been forced to fight uphill. Rare exceptions have been against Skaven, otherwise, factions around you won't have that opportunity unless you seriously screwed up your army composition. Dwarfs are easy to play but hard to master, it's easy for their static nature to come across as weak. It certainly will in competitive PvP multiplayer where players can exploit your weakness. Learn formations and Dwarfs will reward you for it and 90% of your issues go away. Source: Dwarf main since WH1. Completed many Legendary campaigns, mostly on Thorgrim and Belegar.
Irondrakes are downright nasty if you have two checkerboarded among some iron breakers in the middle Frontline. Make them crossfire and everything just dies.
i would put the canons up one tier, because they have the range to destroy enemy artillery, therefore i have on in each army, other than this i agree with everything on this list. thank you, good job!
This is a good point that I almost never see mentioned. I keep one cannon in every army for exactly this. The Dwarf Engineer's entrenchment skill is tailor-made for making sure you win any artillery trading in the early game too
Never used to like dwarfs until I found your channel and formation guides Have turned them into one of my favorite factions now that I know the ideal army compositions and formations to use them with. Awesome stuff man
I’d say that if you’re playing Thorgrim specifically Hammerers easily go into A-tier because they become a support unit that buffs the physical resistance of nearby units. Have 2 of them mixed in with your Ironbreakers to make them even more absurdly tanky, or send them to help your ranged units if they get engaged with to hopefully make them last long enough for the enemy to be cleared out.
I've certainly seen some love for Rangers here. I think they're an excellent utility unit. Some more experimenting could perhaps see them go up higher but I feel the army they're apart of is what stops them hitting A Tier. Once you go up the Tiers you don't have Cavalry or mobile support to complement and keep them safe later on, but I do love having a small hit squad of them with an engineer and doing some epic flanking!
My favorite WH faction! After watching your Dwarf guides, I have a new fire for a fresh campaign. I'm going to give your missile unit formations a go... it looks really viable. I already have the configuration in my head for the Irondrakes, Thunderers and Trollhammers. Really great videos, bud! I am enjoying them alot, so keep up the excellent work and I'll continue to watch!
Awesome! Check out the formations guide if you need any ideas using Irondrakes as there's a bit less plug'n'play than the rest of their units. Cheers and happy hunting!
I have done two campaigns taking over ever settlement on the map in twwh2 and 3 as dwarves, which obviously requires many many armies to deal with threats from every angle, while I would make fancy armies, the bulk of my forces were super basic armies of a lord, 3 grudgethrowers, 8 shield warriors, 8 shield quarrellers. not a top tier army but they can be recruited super quickly in newly captured areas, can hold their own against most forces, cheap enough that I don't mind leaving them sat in a city to stabilise public order. Later in the game where I held a lot of settlements the lords could be recruited at max level which is an amazing buff for an army like this.
I disagree on the 'Bare essentials' skill. You should always take it because if you give the 'Prospector's Mail' to your engineer, he get the snipe attribute (can fire while remaining hidden) and so as long as you stay far from any ennemy unit they can't see you because of 'stalk' attribute (on 'Bare Essentials' and 'Prospector's Mail'). Therefore they can't attack you with anything and the armor is useless. You can craft the 'Prospector's Mail' in the Forge for 90 oathgold and furs. The items (all in the forge) I like to use for the engineer are: Weapon: Ironwarden's Hammer (perfect vigor when leadership above 50%) OR Prospector's Pickaxe (Enables sundering attacks) Armor: Prospector's Mail (speed +5%, stalk, snipe and strider) Talisman: Old Guard's Tankard (HP+6%, heal when out of melee) OR Miner's Lantern (Vanguard Deployment) to snipe artillery Enchanted Item: Prospector's Spyglass (Missile Strength +20%,+15 accuracy for allies within 40m)
Chorf roster I'd argue is the most complete in the game and trumps every faction haha. Agree Rune Giants would be awesome. I think we're likely to get Malakai, Slayer heroes and the Thunderbarge, which will all give the roster more kick!
In defense of the thanes. They have the Ironbeard skill at level 12. Which alows them to give the enemy flamable for -20% fire resist. Which synergizes stupidly well with IronDrakes, flame cannons, and blasting charges. All of which do AoE damage. Thanes just so happen to be very good at clumping up infantry. Oh he also gets 75% fire resist so you don't even need to feel bad about the inevitable friendly fire.
In my opinion I think Slayer should be go down to tier C or D. Although they are easy to recruit and have a great bonus anti large, they perform badly in battle. Any tier 3 plus melee infantry can beat slayers and having no armor is a huge disadvantage, plus you have to pull up with the slow replenishment rate the dwarfs have. Better use the slots to get more way more cost effective units. Other than that love the video man huge support 💙
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. Slayers really are a support unit and not a replacement for other infantry. Having them just as your backline reserves to intercept flanking cavalry can really see some strong results. Similar to irondrakes, bringing them forward before you've sent a couple of units out to push their archers back is going to be rough for them, but for the reasons you mention, if you hold them back and use them later in the battle to flank they can run a muck. Unless it's a crisis army I'd only carry 2 at most... and only if they were insta-hired haha. Without that recruitment there's good argument for only being usable or worse (because corruption currently does *nothing* in WH3) but as a niche unit that can tangle decently with later game matchups and easily obtained (instantly making them relevant). For me, I feel confident in awarding a B Tier for the combination of these things but all of your criticisms are completely on point. Cheers for sharing your experience!
If you're using slayers on the frontline against infantry you're either Ungrim or a wazzok. I wouldn't bring them in standing armies either, because it's better to shoot stuff down, if you can. Having said that, sometimes you can't. They are definitely not 'outperformed' by any other unit, because no other dwarven unit does what they do: counter-flanking, counter-charging and backline sweeping. As for whether they are solid or useable, if you use them for what they are meant to be used for, 'solid' is definitely justified, because they will absolutely eradicate anything large you throw them at and crucially, they don't need line of sight, are fast and work great in a pinch. They also don't get screwed by terrain, can do their job in forests etc. 1-2 per army can be justified if you're going up against factions that have a lot of large and more if you're going up against ogres.
If you are having problems with the shared magic cooldowns just bring a second runesmith or use a runelord with your runesmith so you can cast the same spell more often.
Just build the bugmans building in a minor settlement since its only tier 3? THey have regen, good range good stats, stealthy acceptable melee stats ... I dont really understand why the Bugmans Rangers are lower than Thunderes tbh
Wholeheartedly agree. I do mention this when addressing the various units. Belegar makes all Ranger Units go up a Tier, for example. He also makes Bolt Throwers jump up a Tier, providing valuable anti-large if you go Ranger heavy. Funny you mention this, I have a Dwarf Formations vid dropping in 12 hours with this exact formation haha
Quarrelers with great weapons definitely not a c tier unit. As far as I know spam of quarelers with shields+great weapons with completely throwing infantry into the trash bin is one of the meta composition for early campaign. Mainly due to how shit is casualty replenishment of dwarves is. When you use autocombat melee infantry take larger portion of damage before archers. Removing melee infantry makes damage spread more evenly thus making it faster to recover.
I never base any of my info on autoresolve or bugs/expoits - ie something that 1 patch could completely change, so I don't punish melee units like some might (but fair point). I always field at least 5 warriors early on, but the argument I had against quarallers is the shield circumvents their slow speed and allows them to trade and win against most ranged units, which is excellent. In melee they hold well enough, but so do Warriors which you can use formations (like in the video) to prevent them getting caught in melee, meaning the ranged protection should be all they need. As for AP, thunderers are an incredible way of dealing with this. I'm not disagreeing that they are a good unit, but compared to the cost and utility I struggled to find it. Not saying you're wrong, these are good convos to have, this is just what resulted in my rating.
@@ElvenPlotArmour I don't usually use full quarrellers army myself because I find it boring, but autocombat definitely should be considered for normal players, because fighting every battle because autocombat is wasting too much lives in easiest battles is tedious. Also having full ranged army have its merits because your frontline can shoot before engagement and great weapons can be placed in such a way that they are less likely to be shot (in the back of the formation for example)
They can certainly perform well, but their coverage is largely covered by ironbreakers and thunderers. I typically just keep a couple of Flame-Drakes to clear any chaff and this nimble unit doesn't obstruct any formations and can avoid friendly fire. Flame Cannons can deal considerable damage, but they lose some favor with me because those recruitment turns could be spent on Organ Guns which will down the threats that actually threaten a Dwarven formation. In essence, they're a powerful unit that covers ground you can otherwise cover at high cost and come at the opportunity cost of Organ Guns, which are arguably indispensable. In the context of the campaign and roster is why I award them B Tier, but I completely understand and respect one's rational for placing them in A Tier.
@Elven Plot Armour I've dabbled around with replacing Organ guns with thunderers, and delegating infantry killing to 3 flame cannons. Thunderers take out the large/SE units. It's worked better than I thought. Though, I'd only use it for armies that will be fighting the more melee focused/short ranged factions such as VC, WoC, deamons, Dark elves, lizardmen etc.
I found that Flame Cannons with Flakkson's Rune of Seeking can actually do quite a number on all but the heaviest-armored monsters, too, while losing none of their anti-infantry punch. The sheer amount of raw damage on them can brute-force lesser-armored monsters, and flame attacks can make quite a difference against regenerating ones. I like putting 1-2 alongside Organ Guns. The two are both all-rounders, with the Flame Cannon more anti-infantry and the Organ Gun mroe anti-large oriented, so they complement each other and yet can still do work in the other one's niche.
As the Dwarfs are so immobile, I've always been frustrated with enemy artillery (hellstorm rockets, Cygores, _especially_ Hellcannons). As good as Organ guns are, they just don't have the range to be a counter-battery unit. Of all the anti-siege methods you mentioned, which is your favorite?
This is where gyrobombers are really handy to have. If you're outranged then deploy far back but away from any trees and send your gyrocopters/bombers out to either destroy the artillery or bait out their ammo. You're right, you cannot afford to be outranged as the Dawi, so having 1 or 2 (at most) Gyros will this role to help them fight your fight, your way. Anti-siege? Tbh I love irondrakes and love blowing holes in the gate/walls and jetting fire into them to suround the heroes they blob up against. Flame drakes can hilariously shoot up and wreck units up on walls really well too, very good against shielded infantry!
LOL, we have the same opinions on Dwarf units, too - just like the Empire units. It's quite against the grain, given that a lot of folks claim 2H infantry should be preferred over their shielded counterparts. But I want my infantry to sit and tank - and leave the killing to others (unless, we are talking about truly "killer" infantry such as Hammerers or Swordmasters).
Agree with most of your ratings (aside from Bugman's, they're s-tier in my book) but I think you were being a bit charitable by giving the bolt thrower a D. The Hide in Forest ability might be situationally useful maybe, but I'd go for a grudge thrower or quarreler if I only had access to tier 2 units.
@@ElvenPlotArmour With the right thane talent pick (Wanderer) they get snipe; deploying your lord/heroes almost at max weapon range of your rangers will allow the heroes to tank incoming units while your rangers just unload without worrying about being discovered unless you're unlucky. If they're uncovered they're still decent melee combatants with regeneration and charge defense against all which lets them eat cavalry charges. Works especially good if you don't mind corner camping.
That's a take I'd like to hear more about. I've reasoned why I found grudge throwers to be too good to turn down. What's your setup to make the cannons shine? Cheers for sharing!
@@ElvenPlotArmour Did a quick test in skirmish, dwarf lord cannon and grudge thrower vs orc boss and 2 black orc, have the cannons target a black orcs each and just let it play out, cannon does more damage than the grudge thrower at end screen and it has anti large applications. I think the cannon is just way more accurate than the throwers. Maybe in actual battle grudge throwers will have more LOS issues but that just means you need to micro it more. Which is fair since thats all the dwarfs really do on the micro front anyways is pick out targets for its ranged units. Also, it fairs better in auto resolve.
@@HZAres Cheers for the lab result, very interesting. With the AI not so braindead, gunpowder is certainly more valuable than it was in WH2 where they'd routinely march to their death. You make a good case for them. My favor toward Throwers is also due to the ability to shower the front line of engaged units with rocks with relative ease. A Master Engineer can improve the accuracy, though in these early stages, artillery really are a support unit so I think you could go either way. Thanks again for sharing your findings!
@@ElvenPlotArmour I don't disagree with, I think they are great against early game armies with lots of infantry that you are bait into a bunch with a thane or lord. But as you progress to the late game that job gets taken over by irondrakes, blasting charges or bombs and the large units become a lot more dangerous to the dwarves as they can punch through your front line. there is nothing like sniping a dragon before it even gets close to your doom box. I tend to run 2 canon and one grudge thrower then drop it altogether when I get organ guns
I am playing dwarf since WH1 as my favourite faction. I like them... but i am sad, they have no archers. In Lore they had archers. And archers have style and are better on walls than muskets and crossbows (i think something with the angle, and so with the hitchance from above. In a test a x300% musket units dealted from a wall lesser damage to the same enemies than a normal unbuffed archer unit). Thunderers in earlygame (rush them or as Belegar from the beginning) are really op. Because they are the only unit which can profit massively from the musket-animations (bows, crossbows, etc are longer, other muskets are to weak in meele). They can fight in Linie with their shield and make a solid stand. Not as good as warriors, but still ok. But their incredible strenght is, when you use them in earlygame as linieinfantry, they will shoot during meelefight. And this makes huge amounts of damage. So at the end against basic orcisch or goblish infantry they will massacre them. The problem is, they are a T3-Unit. So you must push to this or play a dwarven faction which can recruit them from the very early. Belegar currently can recruit them from the start. And other dwarves with T3 Startingtown can build them after 2 turns. But all other factions came to late like Thorgrim. Because their lack of meele will create a huge problem against better armored orcs or units with better charge. So as Belegar i would build warriors for the flanks an Thunderers for the mainline. Katapults are extremly strong because they can fire ober your line. Cannons, organs and co can not. Flammecanons can a bit. All Siegeweapons can outperform the catapults. But over all the catapults will do more sure damage. The organs are great too... but because of the angle i like the catapults more because of the range so they can counter enemy sieges if nessessary. The firecannons are also really strong but have a lack of range and can not shoot great over the line so their is a huge friendly fire risk. And with flammecannons you will not do ff.. trust me ;) I think the flamethrower are not so good in open battles. In city battles or battle with tiny ways they are incredible strong. But in normal huge battles and the ai focusing their troops more on the flanks, they can not perform really good because of their small number. I think Ironbreakers with their explosives or even thunderer from behind are better choose here. Dwarven Infantry is not their to deal damage at all. Their rolle is to stand and keep the enemy away. The damage came from the range units... especially the crossbows. One of these guys can kill over 400 enemies in a battle. You can buff them with damage, ammo, etc and they can shoot over the line. They can even shoot greater enemies straight over the own infantry, which can no other unit, because of the different sizes. At the end i will say, that i mod the units for me. I am disappointed that in a lore were numbers are such a great factor, CA desided to balance through stats like allways. And so the dwarves armies are as strong in numbers as orcs (the most numerous race in warhammer lore!), highelves and co. But in lore they have huge population problems. So as info: The dwarven army which reconquered parts of eight peaks counts 500 men. The last retreat from eight peaks before its fall was fought through attacking endless hordes of skaven and orcs (both also fighting against eachother) and the dwarves escaped with only 50 men wounded and 3 lost. The greatest existing kingdoms of the dwarves are Karaz a Karak and Karak Kadrin. The last one has a standing army of 2.500 men and 40.000 population. Karaz a Karak has ca. 60.000 pops and 1.500 warriors. In the game one army is bigger than these numbers. So i modded it for me (still balanced) that the dwarves only have 60 men per unit (lesser amounts are not balanceable because of the changebonus and flanking bonuses).
I actually like their preference for crossbows as they require more engineering which is right up their ally. Thunderers absolutely smash for the reasons you mention, the fact they're shielded is commonly overlooked! Organ Guns are a staple in any late game and I feel the opportunity used to get a flame cannon is a waste of an organ gun. Regarding flamedrakes, I used to think "meh", and now they're among my favorite units, the ability to globally hire them in a single turn makes them useful in the late game, though I only ever get 2. Their small number is actually a strength in that you can easily avoid friendly fire and thunderers behind them get easy shots, making them a great front liner. Once the battle has engaged, send warriors up to push their archers away, then flamedrakes can cook the frontline. Really enjoyed reading the lore breakdown. Concessions do need to be made for the game, but the vibe and attitude of the Dawi is amazing which could be argued to be the most important factor. Cheers for taking the time to comment.
Flame cannons are better than Organ Cannon in my opinion, they have way stronger damage and better hit rate. They have lower ranger for sure, but you can upgrade it a bit with technology. They are hardly in A tier or S for me.
This one really comes to the units that support it. I find the Organ Gun answers serious threats to the Dawi while the Flame Cannon deals with enemies your Irondrakes, Ironbreakers and gunpowder can deal with. The range upgrade certainly helps, but I found they didn't really offer as much whilst having a short range of easily dodged rounds which can do serious friendly fire. That's just my findings though, would like to hear your use as they seem like a winner for you!
Ever since the first game, I've had one question when it comes to dwarf units: Why in the name of Grimnir's finely groomed beard do Ironbreakers only have bronze shields!?
Gyrobomber is a bit overrated since its single entity. Single entity have problems that damage that they take through out the battle will remain even on campaign screen. This is why normal gyrocopters are better, if they dont lose models they get full replenishment after battle like they didn't take any damage what so ever, with good micro and management they could give you value in multiple battles back to back. This is why monster infantry and any other unit that has health bars of single entity and and more then 3 models per unit are busted (and CA hasn't fixed it since warhammer 1).
You make a great point about the power of monster squads replenishing. I don't disagree with what you said at all, but the bomber being a single unit definitely has its own advantages. It's very difficult to maneuver the copters around heavy archer fire without taking damage. They're still great units, but the bomber can fly around freely through archer formations without being hit at all which really is powerful. It's small and nimble to boot! Possibly perception, but I find it much better in WH3 now!
I'd go Dwarf Warriors with shields for your early to mid front line and only hire the odd longbeard. However they both benefit from the red skill trees. The initial Warrior skills is excellent and also buffs you garrison units too, a must have in my eyes. When Ironbreakers are unlocked, get 4 of those and you'll never have to worry again!
Will get to Skaven, I haven't much experience in WH3 but it's typically case of defending your missiles with chaff while levelling up your casters and using artillery & weapons teams to great effect!
@@ElvenPlotArmour yeah but I'm at a point where my Frontline of slaves are getting chopped to bits, so should I go for plague priests? Or go right for the stormvermin? I've got tretch, and skrolk. So I'll get bonuses from them plus throt the unclean, who on his first test; his army annihilated altdorf. But I'm running into the habit of finding more and more melee troop with high AP values.
@@alpharius4819 Skaven have excellent characters so it's common place to bring more heroes to help bolster the frontline. Stormvermin have a bit of a bad wrap but the halberd version can help protect the backline. Using your menace belows to help disable their ranged units at opportune moments is invaluable can also assist. As a rule of thumb, as you are approaching the mid-late game, if you haven't teched up you''ll really feel your armies getting rolled
Hey is there a discord for this it would be fun to skirmish and post matches on the channel we paid alot of money basically 1 game I'd like some validation
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The elf is trying to tell us who the best Dawi is. That's a grudgin!
This comment is more glorious than emojis can explain
yea that goes into the book...
Can we get this guy more subs already?
Dude if only. This guy took me from easy easy to hard hard with two videos.
Thanks for the support guys!
Thane increased ammo for ironbreakers miners blasting charges and irondrakes is pretty good and for my view a must have aswell
I really like the dwarf roster, because it has such a solid core of tank and gun powder DPS and artillery. The roster inherently doesn't need a lot of micro but really rewards the use of a single specialized unit such as the iron Drake for infantry clearing or a gyrocopter for counter artillery
Love and agree with all of this!
I think their roster is awful, they have no solution to deal with long range artillery outside of grudge throwers, iron breakers melt like snow,and get tossed around left rigth and center by anything with some armor piercing and mass, thunderers shoot their front line in the back everytime you fight uphill,Heroes and lords have no mounts, they cant flank...the only good thing about dwarves is they have excellent auto resolve i ve got heroic victories attacking cities with a mid tier full stack in them in very hard difficulty ... They desesperatly need some cavalry units mounted on rams equivalent to Khorne juggernauts limited speed but lot of mass with anti infantry, shield and armor piercing To me they are the weakest race on the battle field after Cathay
and Bretonnia
@@calgar42k Gyrocopters are the solution to long range artillery. They're incredibly op against the AI forces. Start them on the flanks and send them out, swoop them around the back of the enemy army and just nuke the unit. Iron Breakers have extreme amounts of melee defence and will still hold far longer than any other infantry in the game. AP doesn't matter when they can parry most of the attacks coming their way, I don't know where you're seeing Ironbreakers being melted. Is mass an issue? Probably monsters - send thunderers their way and it's sorted.
Heroes don't need mounts. They're one-man line holders. You don't need to flank as Dwarfs, if you learn how to properly utilize gunpowder formations, you have plenty of openings for your ranged units to fire in on the enemy once the line clash. If you seriously need hammers for your anvil, Slayers and Hammerers are fine for that. Not necessary otherwise.
Your problem with Thunderers can be applied to any gunpowder unit. In all of my legendary campaigns I've played from WH1 to WH3 as Dwarfs, I have rarely been forced to fight uphill. Rare exceptions have been against Skaven, otherwise, factions around you won't have that opportunity unless you seriously screwed up your army composition.
Dwarfs are easy to play but hard to master, it's easy for their static nature to come across as weak. It certainly will in competitive PvP multiplayer where players can exploit your weakness. Learn formations and Dwarfs will reward you for it and 90% of your issues go away.
Source: Dwarf main since WH1. Completed many Legendary campaigns, mostly on Thorgrim and Belegar.
Irondrakes are downright nasty if you have two checkerboarded among some iron breakers in the middle Frontline. Make them crossfire and everything just dies.
i would put the canons up one tier, because they have the range to destroy enemy artillery, therefore i have on in each army, other than this i agree with everything on this list. thank you, good job!
This is a good point that I almost never see mentioned. I keep one cannon in every army for exactly this. The Dwarf Engineer's entrenchment skill is tailor-made for making sure you win any artillery trading in the early game too
Can you do Skaven? Your channel's basically the only one I really believe in
Appreciated! It'll take me a while to get there, but I will get there :)
Never used to like dwarfs until I found your channel and formation guides
Have turned them into one of my favorite factions now that I know the ideal army compositions and formations to use them with. Awesome stuff man
That's so cool to hear. They're really rewarding and thematic once you sink your teeth into them. They're a top 5 for me too!
I’d say that if you’re playing Thorgrim specifically Hammerers easily go into A-tier because they become a support unit that buffs the physical resistance of nearby units. Have 2 of them mixed in with your Ironbreakers to make them even more absurdly tanky, or send them to help your ranged units if they get engaged with to hopefully make them last long enough for the enemy to be cleared out.
Epic combinatino!
Ranger units are amazing when your heroe gives them snipe. The AI still has problems reacting to it, especially in cities.
I've certainly seen some love for Rangers here. I think they're an excellent utility unit. Some more experimenting could perhaps see them go up higher but I feel the army they're apart of is what stops them hitting A Tier. Once you go up the Tiers you don't have Cavalry or mobile support to complement and keep them safe later on, but I do love having a small hit squad of them with an engineer and doing some epic flanking!
@Elven Plot Armour I remember my Bugman ranger doomstack with belegar. It was beautiful.
great tier list! was looking for a dwaf list this year!
Stoked you enjoyed. Check out my Dwarf Mastery video. I think it's among my best work, if you'd like more Dwarf content.
My favorite WH faction! After watching your Dwarf guides, I have a new fire for a fresh campaign. I'm going to give your missile unit formations a go... it looks really viable. I already have the configuration in my head for the Irondrakes, Thunderers and Trollhammers. Really great videos, bud! I am enjoying them alot, so keep up the excellent work and I'll continue to watch!
Awesome! Check out the formations guide if you need any ideas using Irondrakes as there's a bit less plug'n'play than the rest of their units.
Cheers and happy hunting!
I have done two campaigns taking over ever settlement on the map in twwh2 and 3 as dwarves, which obviously requires many many armies to deal with threats from every angle, while I would make fancy armies, the bulk of my forces were super basic armies of a lord, 3 grudgethrowers, 8 shield warriors, 8 shield quarrellers. not a top tier army but they can be recruited super quickly in newly captured areas, can hold their own against most forces, cheap enough that I don't mind leaving them sat in a city to stabilise public order. Later in the game where I held a lot of settlements the lords could be recruited at max level which is an amazing buff for an army like this.
Please do another campaign livestream. They are really great to watch! Keep the good stuff coming bro!
I second this.
Appreciate the support! Life's a bit hectic atm but I'll do what I can when possible!
I disagree on the 'Bare essentials' skill. You should always take it because if you give the 'Prospector's Mail' to your engineer, he get the snipe attribute (can fire while remaining hidden) and so as long as you stay far from any ennemy unit they can't see you because of 'stalk' attribute (on 'Bare Essentials' and 'Prospector's Mail'). Therefore they can't attack you with anything and the armor is useless. You can craft the 'Prospector's Mail' in the Forge for 90 oathgold and furs.
The items (all in the forge) I like to use for the engineer are:
Weapon: Ironwarden's Hammer (perfect vigor when leadership above 50%) OR Prospector's Pickaxe (Enables sundering attacks)
Armor: Prospector's Mail (speed +5%, stalk, snipe and strider)
Talisman: Old Guard's Tankard (HP+6%, heal when out of melee) OR Miner's Lantern (Vanguard Deployment) to snipe artillery
Enchanted Item: Prospector's Spyglass (Missile Strength +20%,+15 accuracy for allies within 40m)
I loved this comment. Awesome setup on that "hunter engineer" setup. You've really looked into your equipment. Respect!
Chorf roster honestly outshines dwarves in every way now. We need a rune giant.
Chorf roster I'd argue is the most complete in the game and trumps every faction haha. Agree Rune Giants would be awesome. I think we're likely to get Malakai, Slayer heroes and the Thunderbarge, which will all give the roster more kick!
Dorfs need a giant steam powered mech suit. That would be badass
In defense of the thanes. They have the Ironbeard skill at level 12. Which alows them to give the enemy flamable for -20% fire resist. Which synergizes stupidly well with IronDrakes, flame cannons, and blasting charges. All of which do AoE damage. Thanes just so happen to be very good at clumping up infantry. Oh he also gets 75% fire resist so you don't even need to feel bad about the inevitable friendly fire.
In my opinion I think Slayer should be go down to tier C or D. Although they are easy to recruit and have a great bonus anti large, they perform badly in battle. Any tier 3 plus melee infantry can beat slayers and having no armor is a huge disadvantage, plus you have to pull up with the slow replenishment rate the dwarfs have. Better use the slots to get more way more cost effective units. Other than that love the video man huge support 💙
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. Slayers really are a support unit and not a replacement for other infantry. Having them just as your backline reserves to intercept flanking cavalry can really see some strong results. Similar to irondrakes, bringing them forward before you've sent a couple of units out to push their archers back is going to be rough for them, but for the reasons you mention, if you hold them back and use them later in the battle to flank they can run a muck. Unless it's a crisis army I'd only carry 2 at most... and only if they were insta-hired haha. Without that recruitment there's good argument for only being usable or worse (because corruption currently does *nothing* in WH3) but as a niche unit that can tangle decently with later game matchups and easily obtained (instantly making them relevant). For me, I feel confident in awarding a B Tier for the combination of these things but all of your criticisms are completely on point. Cheers for sharing your experience!
If you're using slayers on the frontline against infantry you're either Ungrim or a wazzok. I wouldn't bring them in standing armies either, because it's better to shoot stuff down, if you can.
Having said that, sometimes you can't. They are definitely not 'outperformed' by any other unit, because no other dwarven unit does what they do: counter-flanking, counter-charging and backline sweeping.
As for whether they are solid or useable, if you use them for what they are meant to be used for, 'solid' is definitely justified, because they will absolutely eradicate anything large you throw them at and crucially, they don't need line of sight, are fast and work great in a pinch. They also don't get screwed by terrain, can do their job in forests etc. 1-2 per army can be justified if you're going up against factions that have a lot of large and more if you're going up against ogres.
Excellent as always. Found nothing to disagree with.
Thanks for watching and the feedback!
If you are having problems with the shared magic cooldowns just bring a second runesmith or use a runelord with your runesmith so you can cast the same spell more often.
Great advice!
Hell yeah, brother.
Thanks mate!
Just build the bugmans building in a minor settlement since its only tier 3?
THey have regen, good range good stats, stealthy acceptable melee stats ...
I dont really understand why the Bugmans Rangers are lower than Thunderes tbh
Well argued. I'll look further into them. This list can be redone once the DLC drops :)
@@ElvenPlotArmour Would love some DLC for Dwarfs, Empire and Bretonnia!
Love the content. Commenting for the algorithm.
Absolute Legend haha
Some of these units change dramatically depending on the lord. Belegar turns rangers into absolute army destroyers for example.
Wholeheartedly agree. I do mention this when addressing the various units. Belegar makes all Ranger Units go up a Tier, for example. He also makes Bolt Throwers jump up a Tier, providing valuable anti-large if you go Ranger heavy. Funny you mention this, I have a Dwarf Formations vid dropping in 12 hours with this exact formation haha
New to your channel. Really like your content and guides. cheers!
Quarrelers with great weapons definitely not a c tier unit. As far as I know spam of quarelers with shields+great weapons with completely throwing infantry into the trash bin is one of the meta composition for early campaign. Mainly due to how shit is casualty replenishment of dwarves is. When you use autocombat melee infantry take larger portion of damage before archers. Removing melee infantry makes damage spread more evenly thus making it faster to recover.
I never base any of my info on autoresolve or bugs/expoits - ie something that 1 patch could completely change, so I don't punish melee units like some might (but fair point). I always field at least 5 warriors early on, but the argument I had against quarallers is the shield circumvents their slow speed and allows them to trade and win against most ranged units, which is excellent. In melee they hold well enough, but so do Warriors which you can use formations (like in the video) to prevent them getting caught in melee, meaning the ranged protection should be all they need. As for AP, thunderers are an incredible way of dealing with this. I'm not disagreeing that they are a good unit, but compared to the cost and utility I struggled to find it. Not saying you're wrong, these are good convos to have, this is just what resulted in my rating.
@@ElvenPlotArmour I don't usually use full quarrellers army myself because I find it boring, but autocombat definitely should be considered for normal players, because fighting every battle because autocombat is wasting too much lives in easiest battles is tedious. Also having full ranged army have its merits because your frontline can shoot before engagement and great weapons can be placed in such a way that they are less likely to be shot (in the back of the formation for example)
Flame cannon is a great unit. They delete infantry. Test them out in the skirmish mode. 3 flame cannons win vs 3 exalted bloodletters, chosen etc.
They can certainly perform well, but their coverage is largely covered by ironbreakers and thunderers. I typically just keep a couple of Flame-Drakes to clear any chaff and this nimble unit doesn't obstruct any formations and can avoid friendly fire. Flame Cannons can deal considerable damage, but they lose some favor with me because those recruitment turns could be spent on Organ Guns which will down the threats that actually threaten a Dwarven formation. In essence, they're a powerful unit that covers ground you can otherwise cover at high cost and come at the opportunity cost of Organ Guns, which are arguably indispensable. In the context of the campaign and roster is why I award them B Tier, but I completely understand and respect one's rational for placing them in A Tier.
@Elven Plot Armour I've dabbled around with replacing Organ guns with thunderers, and delegating infantry killing to 3 flame cannons. Thunderers take out the large/SE units. It's worked better than I thought. Though, I'd only use it for armies that will be fighting the more melee focused/short ranged factions such as VC, WoC, deamons, Dark elves, lizardmen etc.
I found that Flame Cannons with Flakkson's Rune of Seeking can actually do quite a number on all but the heaviest-armored monsters, too, while losing none of their anti-infantry punch. The sheer amount of raw damage on them can brute-force lesser-armored monsters, and flame attacks can make quite a difference against regenerating ones. I like putting 1-2 alongside Organ Guns. The two are both all-rounders, with the Flame Cannon more anti-infantry and the Organ Gun mroe anti-large oriented, so they complement each other and yet can still do work in the other one's niche.
i hate to say it, but legend has some competition for good wh3 content
A rising tide lifts all boats!
As the Dwarfs are so immobile, I've always been frustrated with enemy artillery (hellstorm rockets, Cygores, _especially_ Hellcannons). As good as Organ guns are, they just don't have the range to be a counter-battery unit.
Of all the anti-siege methods you mentioned, which is your favorite?
This is where gyrobombers are really handy to have. If you're outranged then deploy far back but away from any trees and send your gyrocopters/bombers out to either destroy the artillery or bait out their ammo. You're right, you cannot afford to be outranged as the Dawi, so having 1 or 2 (at most) Gyros will this role to help them fight your fight, your way.
Anti-siege? Tbh I love irondrakes and love blowing holes in the gate/walls and jetting fire into them to suround the heroes they blob up against. Flame drakes can hilariously shoot up and wreck units up on walls really well too, very good against shielded infantry!
I like to recruit the odd Cavalry unit from a human faction. Even a shitty cavalry unit can do wonders when your whole army can only walk.
One third of quarellers damage is armor piercing. So they aren't completely useless againts full armor stacks.
LOL, we have the same opinions on Dwarf units, too - just like the Empire units. It's quite against the grain, given that a lot of folks claim 2H infantry should be preferred over their shielded counterparts. But I want my infantry to sit and tank - and leave the killing to others (unless, we are talking about truly "killer" infantry such as Hammerers or Swordmasters).
Agree with most of your ratings (aside from Bugman's, they're s-tier in my book) but I think you were being a bit charitable by giving the bolt thrower a D. The Hide in Forest ability might be situationally useful maybe, but I'd go for a grudge thrower or quarreler if I only had access to tier 2 units.
Thanks for sharing - how do you use your Bugmans?
@@ElvenPlotArmour With the right thane talent pick (Wanderer) they get snipe; deploying your lord/heroes almost at max weapon range of your rangers will allow the heroes to tank incoming units while your rangers just unload without worrying about being discovered unless you're unlucky. If they're uncovered they're still decent melee combatants with regeneration and charge defense against all which lets them eat cavalry charges. Works especially good if you don't mind corner camping.
@@halwakka504 Very nice! Thanks for sharing!
I like how you segregate the different Tier units
Thanks mate, takes longer but I love doing it and the story it tells.
I find cannons does more value damage than grudge thrower
That's a take I'd like to hear more about. I've reasoned why I found grudge throwers to be too good to turn down. What's your setup to make the cannons shine? Cheers for sharing!
@@ElvenPlotArmour Did a quick test in skirmish, dwarf lord cannon and grudge thrower vs orc boss and 2 black orc, have the cannons target a black orcs each and just let it play out, cannon does more damage than the grudge thrower at end screen and it has anti large applications. I think the cannon is just way more accurate than the throwers. Maybe in actual battle grudge throwers will have more LOS issues but that just means you need to micro it more. Which is fair since thats all the dwarfs really do on the micro front anyways is pick out targets for its ranged units. Also, it fairs better in auto resolve.
@@HZAres Cheers for the lab result, very interesting. With the AI not so braindead, gunpowder is certainly more valuable than it was in WH2 where they'd routinely march to their death. You make a good case for them. My favor toward Throwers is also due to the ability to shower the front line of engaged units with rocks with relative ease. A Master Engineer can improve the accuracy, though in these early stages, artillery really are a support unit so I think you could go either way. Thanks again for sharing your findings!
@@ElvenPlotArmour I don't disagree with, I think they are great against early game armies with lots of infantry that you are bait into a bunch with a thane or lord. But as you progress to the late game that job gets taken over by irondrakes, blasting charges or bombs and the large units become a lot more dangerous to the dwarves as they can punch through your front line. there is nothing like sniping a dragon before it even gets close to your doom box. I tend to run 2 canon and one grudge thrower then drop it altogether when I get organ guns
@@HZAres That's a nice setup, I have to try it!
I am playing dwarf since WH1 as my favourite faction. I like them... but i am sad, they have no archers. In Lore they had archers. And archers have style and are better on walls than muskets and crossbows (i think something with the angle, and so with the hitchance from above. In a test a x300% musket units dealted from a wall lesser damage to the same enemies than a normal unbuffed archer unit).
Thunderers in earlygame (rush them or as Belegar from the beginning) are really op. Because they are the only unit which can profit massively from the musket-animations (bows, crossbows, etc are longer, other muskets are to weak in meele). They can fight in Linie with their shield and make a solid stand. Not as good as warriors, but still ok. But their incredible strenght is, when you use them in earlygame as linieinfantry, they will shoot during meelefight. And this makes huge amounts of damage. So at the end against basic orcisch or goblish infantry they will massacre them. The problem is, they are a T3-Unit. So you must push to this or play a dwarven faction which can recruit them from the very early. Belegar currently can recruit them from the start. And other dwarves with T3 Startingtown can build them after 2 turns. But all other factions came to late like Thorgrim. Because their lack of meele will create a huge problem against better armored orcs or units with better charge.
So as Belegar i would build warriors for the flanks an Thunderers for the mainline.
Katapults are extremly strong because they can fire ober your line. Cannons, organs and co can not. Flammecanons can a bit. All Siegeweapons can outperform the catapults. But over all the catapults will do more sure damage. The organs are great too... but because of the angle i like the catapults more because of the range so they can counter enemy sieges if nessessary. The firecannons are also really strong but have a lack of range and can not shoot great over the line so their is a huge friendly fire risk. And with flammecannons you will not do ff.. trust me ;)
I think the flamethrower are not so good in open battles. In city battles or battle with tiny ways they are incredible strong. But in normal huge battles and the ai focusing their troops more on the flanks, they can not perform really good because of their small number. I think Ironbreakers with their explosives or even thunderer from behind are better choose here.
Dwarven Infantry is not their to deal damage at all. Their rolle is to stand and keep the enemy away. The damage came from the range units... especially the crossbows. One of these guys can kill over 400 enemies in a battle. You can buff them with damage, ammo, etc and they can shoot over the line. They can even shoot greater enemies straight over the own infantry, which can no other unit, because of the different sizes.
At the end i will say, that i mod the units for me. I am disappointed that in a lore were numbers are such a great factor, CA desided to balance through stats like allways. And so the dwarves armies are as strong in numbers as orcs (the most numerous race in warhammer lore!), highelves and co. But in lore they have huge population problems.
So as info: The dwarven army which reconquered parts of eight peaks counts 500 men. The last retreat from eight peaks before its fall was fought through attacking endless hordes of skaven and orcs (both also fighting against eachother) and the dwarves escaped with only 50 men wounded and 3 lost.
The greatest existing kingdoms of the dwarves are Karaz a Karak and Karak Kadrin. The last one has a standing army of 2.500 men and 40.000 population. Karaz a Karak has ca. 60.000 pops and 1.500 warriors. In the game one army is bigger than these numbers. So i modded it for me (still balanced) that the dwarves only have 60 men per unit (lesser amounts are not balanceable because of the changebonus and flanking bonuses).
I actually like their preference for crossbows as they require more engineering which is right up their ally. Thunderers absolutely smash for the reasons you mention, the fact they're shielded is commonly overlooked! Organ Guns are a staple in any late game and I feel the opportunity used to get a flame cannon is a waste of an organ gun. Regarding flamedrakes, I used to think "meh", and now they're among my favorite units, the ability to globally hire them in a single turn makes them useful in the late game, though I only ever get 2. Their small number is actually a strength in that you can easily avoid friendly fire and thunderers behind them get easy shots, making them a great front liner. Once the battle has engaged, send warriors up to push their archers away, then flamedrakes can cook the frontline.
Really enjoyed reading the lore breakdown. Concessions do need to be made for the game, but the vibe and attitude of the Dawi is amazing which could be argued to be the most important factor. Cheers for taking the time to comment.
Flame cannons are better than Organ Cannon in my opinion, they have way stronger damage and better hit rate. They have lower ranger for sure, but you can upgrade it a bit with technology. They are hardly in A tier or S for me.
This one really comes to the units that support it. I find the Organ Gun answers serious threats to the Dawi while the Flame Cannon deals with enemies your Irondrakes, Ironbreakers and gunpowder can deal with. The range upgrade certainly helps, but I found they didn't really offer as much whilst having a short range of easily dodged rounds which can do serious friendly fire. That's just my findings though, would like to hear your use as they seem like a winner for you!
Any plans to make an updated list when ToD drops?
Ever since the first game, I've had one question when it comes to dwarf units:
Why in the name of Grimnir's finely groomed beard do Ironbreakers only have bronze shields!?
Because not taking arrows to the chin is for sissies!
Gyrobomber is a bit overrated since its single entity. Single entity have problems that damage that they take through out the battle will remain even on campaign screen. This is why normal gyrocopters are better, if they dont lose models they get full replenishment after battle like they didn't take any damage what so ever, with good micro and management they could give you value in multiple battles back to back. This is why monster infantry and any other unit that has health bars of single entity and and more then 3 models per unit are busted (and CA hasn't fixed it since warhammer 1).
You make a great point about the power of monster squads replenishing. I don't disagree with what you said at all, but the bomber being a single unit definitely has its own advantages. It's very difficult to maneuver the copters around heavy archer fire without taking damage. They're still great units, but the bomber can fly around freely through archer formations without being hit at all which really is powerful. It's small and nimble to boot!
Possibly perception, but I find it much better in WH3 now!
Could you renew this for the new update? That would be awesome man.
I feel like dwarves are just what the empire wishes it was
oof! I felt that from here! Which elector count got his name in your book? ;)
@@ElvenPlotArmour haha, nah it’s just because every time I play Karl I can only win if I auto resolve. Any time I actually fight I just get massacred
Question on the buffed up longbeards frontline. Is this technology together with the lord red skill line? Or what buff should I be thinking about?
I'd go Dwarf Warriors with shields for your early to mid front line and only hire the odd longbeard. However they both benefit from the red skill trees. The initial Warrior skills is excellent and also buffs you garrison units too, a must have in my eyes. When Ironbreakers are unlocked, get 4 of those and you'll never have to worry again!
@@ElvenPlotArmour love vids keep it up!
Its tragic they made it so i can only use 1 of the banners per army. I. Warhammer 2 i had 3 grudge throwers with fire damage into the late gameb
Can you do the skaven? I'm in the endgame on my campaign and I need to make armies that are cost-effective, not just armies of skavenslaves.
Will get to Skaven, I haven't much experience in WH3 but it's typically case of defending your missiles with chaff while levelling up your casters and using artillery & weapons teams to great effect!
@@ElvenPlotArmour yeah but I'm at a point where my Frontline of slaves are getting chopped to bits, so should I go for plague priests? Or go right for the stormvermin? I've got tretch, and skrolk. So I'll get bonuses from them plus throt the unclean, who on his first test; his army annihilated altdorf. But I'm running into the habit of finding more and more melee troop with high AP values.
@@alpharius4819 Skaven have excellent characters so it's common place to bring more heroes to help bolster the frontline. Stormvermin have a bit of a bad wrap but the halberd version can help protect the backline. Using your menace belows to help disable their ranged units at opportune moments is invaluable can also assist. As a rule of thumb, as you are approaching the mid-late game, if you haven't teched up you''ll really feel your armies getting rolled
Where would Thunderbarges go
S - without a doubt!
Hey is there a discord for this it would be fun to skirmish and post matches on the channel we paid alot of money basically 1 game I'd like some validation
Discord: discord.gg/p6BrxVVPfM
All welcome and there's a replay session. Plenty of friendly folk to share and bounce ideas off.
Come one, come all.
The balls on this mf to make a warhammer dwarf tier list 😅 great intro
Thanks 😅
Worst race in the game by far.
It's a poor craftsman who blames his tools.
@@Antidragon-nl7by I was hoping someone would just say that's going in the book. Actually really enjoyed the stunties in game 2
Its my favorite, and my most played faction by far :p
Definitely going in the book bro ;)
Each time they feel like they're falling behind, CA update them and currently they play great!
Nonsense. They're not a weak race.