I think the uniqueness is fun. That campaign shouldn't be approached in the same way as others. That been said, I hope we get some other FLC for Tzeench to balance that out.
Yeah but is "balanced" really what we want? I am not saying it's fun if X faction destroys all others with no issue, but some factions has always been more or less unbalanced.
@@NielsMulvad Yes, the challenge of some faction should definitely made part of their campaign. I haven't played them in over a year, but Clan Angrund was one of the hardest, but most fun campaign. But, they should all allowed to become strong. I mean, Tyrion is just boring mode, kicking easy enemies time and time again, at least it was when I last played.
Actually all factions are overpowered. Some more and some less. Because that's what most players want. Reaching this Moment where you just dominate and roll over your enemies. It shouldn't be too easy but the players still can't be balanced for this. We wouldn't stand a chance against a real intelligent KI.
@@spierchen2052 I hear what you are saying, but that is not what anyone mean when they say overpowered. Being overpowered is not when a faction performs better when a player uses them, nor when we build optimized doom stacks. Overpowered is when you make spartan hoplites in Rome:TotalWar and they can tank 4 other units. (enhancing the performance to hammer the meaning home). If every faction is overpowered, then none of them are. They would be perfectly balanced, which would be boring and remove the flavor of most of the campaigns. Rather having some really strong factions, and some really weak, both in terms of unit rooster, the start location, economical possibility's and the tech. Well that is where the flavor of TW games starts to really shine.
If Deathmaster Snikch has a million Gutter Runners(Poison), I'm one of them If Deathmaster Snikch has 5 Gutter Runners(Poison), I'm one of them If Deathmaster Snikch has 1 Gutter Runners(Poison), that one is me If Deathmaster Snikch has no units, I'm no longer alive If every skaven is against Deathmaster Snikch I'm against every skaven Till my last point of health (50 per model), I'll support Deathmaster Snikch
I think all boris really needs for his campaign is the option to return to Kislev early on, so you choose either a chaos waste campaign or a regular Kislev campaign. As well as, involvement in the Kislev confederation mechanics with options to get both katarin and Constaltin. Those 2 simple changes would make his campaign a lot more…bear…able
As is, I like him the best of the Kislev LLs, but I have to migrate back to Kislev. Legend gave a blueprint in his review of the campaign way back, on how to get back to Kislev and have an actual campaign.
I'd honestly prefer an expedition mechanic like Wulfhart has, allowing for the recruitment of units instantly in times of need, along with some dilemmas and potential bonuses based on your choices. I really like this side of Wulfhart's mechanics,I wouldn''t mind seeing it implemented for other factions with an expeditionary feel to them
@@unmeclambda5837 It feels like Boris has a different approach, it's not an expedition it's a suicide mission, for him or for chaos. He is the cavalry, no one is coming
It got rough for me this past campaign because I defeated 1 Kislev Lord and the turn after all of Kislev basically confederated and moved all their armies together. I had to wear them down with multiple armies rushing through their territory sacking and razing settlements until my allies could move in for some decisive kills.
@@CodeineTuttiFrutti He already did that before. Dont want to beat the joke to death. One man doomstacks are really just "legendary lord power" tierlists. Which he's already done.
@@booradley6832 its not a "one man doomstack tierlist" because he rate the lords based on various criteria: combat, buffs on the company map, and the faction in general.
I don't mind the different factions being stronger or weaker, the lore is that some factions are absolute monsters and other barely hanging on and it gives you options to play as under dog or just as a steamroller - would not want them to perfectly balance everything
The only reson why the Empire is recomended as a starter faction is becouse of how insanely popular it is rather then actually being a good starter faction. The imperial authority mechanic is by far less punishing then it was in WH2 but your still pretty mutch have enemys coming at u from every direction and what desides how miserable your early game is gonna be is dependent on how good or bad the elector counts desides to play. In my latest try i hade the Beastmen coming from the NE, Vampires from the E, Greenskins from the W and the goblins from the SW mountains all of them pretty mutch acted like they hade a military alliance from turn 5 and by turn 15 they all hade a full stack each that were attacking. It was absurd, recomended for new ppl hell no.
A little more justifiable with nuln being as crazy as it is Once you've learnt the glory of early game free company, even life against Vlad becomes manageable
@@blugger I'm struggling, I've had 3 rounds in the last few days, and between Chaos in the North, undead in the South, Orks in the South, North, and West, and an the dreaded Wood Elves I am feeling like it's a harder struggle then lore for 40k and Fantasy combined. It's both glorious and frustrating. I've got a feeling the developers are trying to push people away from the Empire. But I've had a taste of the brick wall, and it is delicious.
@@TyllerBoom as nuln, I've generally started rolling once as I get the province directly south of the capitol There, soon as I get the garden quest (which will refund most of the cost of building one) and grab the halb + ebon + mortar recruit building, I'm largely set 2-3 ebon knights with free company accompaniment is basically GG. Will still struggle a little with vlad's first army, because his harem is ridiculous and might bleed you hard enough to get overwhelmed by his nigh insta respawn, but after wards I just rolled south through some GG no re ogres, greenskins, and coast. FCM are so ESSENTIAL to playing against Vlad early because just about nothing else has a prayer against him and his flying harem. Plus, they'll also defeat anything short of black knights, with just a bit of micro, while not folding to dang zombies like xbows Plus, I think there are ways to rush out the emperor's wrath STANK but I don't know how it goes.
Drycha is incredibly strong if you turn to order and ally with the empire factions to start. The "most settlements are shit for woodelves" issue is solved if you just don't care about owning them and instead run around taking settlements and selling them to allies. It turns your allies into massive meat shields and nets you ridiculous money. You're basically Nakai the wanderer except Karl Franz is your vassal. Once you're on good terms with order factions, all the other Order factions will want to be your friend as well. Most will even pay to be so. Which means that you can teleport into Cathay, or Orins camp, murder the current occupants of the trees, and pay or be paid by the nearby cathayans/lizardmen for a quick alliance and resolve a war in like 2 turns. "But you're missing out on so much land that way" Who cares, it's shit land. If you owned every settlement in the game, 90% of your income would still be coming from the magical forests (Wood elves have crazy good economy buildings). You earn more money from the rest of the land by looting it from an enemy, waiting a turn if your army needs to recover, then selling it to some idiot high elf for a trade agreement or a few turns of their income, then coming back to repeat the process after they lose the settlement again to orcs.
Khalida's campaign start location is absolute hell also, hot take: I think Cylostra is the second most powerful vampirates lord, but I have a feeling people underrate her because they don't want to hear her voice lol
I don't think that's a hot take, but rather a fact. Luthor's campaign is worse because of his position, as the vampire coast is bad against lizardmen and bretonia
Luthor is the most powerful as he can become a one man doomstack but he definitely has a bad start location compared to Cylostra. Dreadfleet are overrated, he's not a strong lord at all. I'd say in terms of strength Luthor is the best then Cylostra then Noctilus and Aranessa isn't even in the same league. I'm surprised Legend didn't put her in D as she is a terrible commander and a terrible fighter, she gets the worst mount in the game and nothing about her works as a vampire coast faction. The start position is all that saves her from oblivion.
@@Lones555 I disagree with most of what you're saying. Noctilus and the dreadfleet are definitely best, Luthor being a one-man doomstack sometimes is fun but not super powerful and he's not that good of a one-man-doomstack comparatively. Also this might be the actual hot take here but I think Aranessa and her faction are better than Luthor. I think Luthor is the worst vampirate lord/faction. Aranessa isn't great but she gives good buffs to solid early game units which helps create a strong campaign's foundation. The theory of "win more" is relevant here I think, where in some games some abilities, items, units etc have powerful effects but by the time you get to use them you already won, and thus, they are "win more" effects, allowing you to win even harder a game you already won, rather than bring you from a point of struggling into a win.
Just moving her start position to Lahmia, not a minor settlement in the same province, will greatly improve her campaign. I tend to play isolated factions (but not too isolated like Khateph) allowing me to fight more enemies, level up faster, and grow bigger without worrying about diplomacy all too much, and she would've been a perfect candidate for me to play if it wasn't for the start position
I don’t know what it is about tier list videos but I love them. I can’t get enough of them. You could do them every patch and I’d still watch them all.
Norsca may lack content or modern mechanics, but Throgg and Wulfrik are still amazing and Throgg giving his entire army immunity to all forms of attrition makes so many army compositions he leads super effective, not just mass Trolls.
@Project0061 When you factor in minor factions it makes sense. Most D tier and C tier factions struggle because of the major factions they have to deal with. Most S tier and A tier factions propel themselves off the backs of minor factions early game. When you factor in how few major factions are actually problematic, you'll find way more steamroller campaigns compared to struggle campaigns.
Personally Grimgor is a A tier but I understand that being surrounded by Chaos and Ogres might not be best place to start. But I am mostly surprised that Wurrzag is a B tier cuz he got like... crazy early Savage Orcs that are really deadly on the beginning.
B tier is strong. Grimgor can "steamroll" but that was done through exploits like taking the T5 Chaos Dwarf capital by turn 2 or by trait farming the Nurgle lord up north. The exploit was fixed and the Nurgle defeat trait was nerfed into uselessness. Grimgor doesn't have any strong global buffs or faction effects besides Black Orc Warbosses. Because of that, Grom just has by default much stronger armies. Grimgor doesn't even buff his own army's black orcs enough. He has a strong starting position and potential big confederations later but that's all he has going for him. Legend gave him and the rest B tier for the same reason Grom got A tier - because he's not including exploitation within the criteria.
@@somber8233 Correct. I think a lot of people are reminiscing past experiences with a faction (that no longer apply to the current state of the game), thinking of how they are as individual fighting lord, or even how annoying they are to deal with when playing as a different faction. Legend is trying to define, without exploits - though ease of exploitation is a factor - how quickly a faction can express and rise to dominant power.
Grimgor is only better than Azhag in Greenskin terms, the other faction leaders are so far above him. I think B is high for Grimgor, I'd put him in C with Azhag in D. Skarsnik and Wurrzag in A and Grom in S. If you want to do a legendary playthrough with the Greenskins Grom's campaign is a cakewalk (provided the wandering hag mechanic works as it tends to break every time the game patches forcing you to restart the campaign).
I feel if all of Boris' armies were immune to chaos attrition and not just him it'd be a lot easier to expand in the wastes. It wouldn't make him a S tier powerhouse but it'd get him out of D tier at the minimum. Expanding is difficult when you lose units every turn unless you always give up range to encamp
Hellebron is A tier imo. The buff to witch elves + that blood voyage + the increase to slaves + op sacrifice rite + more hags is A tier worthy in my exp. She bodies all her nearby enemies even though the Valkia battle is hard. Interested to see if anyone agrees or disagrees
Disagree because Valkia is right next to her, making the fight with her inevitable also witch elves and sisters of Slaughter are countered by Warriors/Chosen of Khorne(duel axes). If she were anywhere else on the map, she would arguably be the best DE Lord
Har Ganeth is the best Dark Elf faction. Its merely an issue of always being forced to attack and expand with them which hampers the experience. Who rests rusts. Especially true with Hellebron.
Hellebron is strong because Dark Elfs in general are really strong as a baseline. I’m with you in that I don’t think the Naggaroth start is as bad as Legend says but it is objectively a harder than normal situation with Valkia and Sigvald at your door.
Appreciate the responses. I agree with the difficult starting area with Valkia and Sigvald. I totally forgot that Daniel beelines straight for you too!! Gonna start a new campaign this afternoon 😁
17:10 What do you mean, the moment you get nasty skulkers you won the Campaign. Grom's cauldron buffs are so strong that by turn 5 you have a gobbo unbeatable doomstack
I was about to use this same justification for skarskink. -40% upkeep on gobbos is nuts, especially with wag mechanics. Orcs are overrated My greenskin ranking: S: Grom and Skarskink A: Grimgor and Wurzag B: Azag
Yeah all of Grom's goblin buffs are a bit bonkers, and as far as just getting his short and long victory goals, they're surprisingly easy, especially with how bad the AI appears to be at dealing with Morathi, Noctilus, and even Cylostra. In about 70% of my games the High Elves just get mopped by some combination of those 3. He essentially turns regular goblin spears into Silverin Guard equivalent units, and then you add Cauldron buffs on top. The only thing I dislike about his early game is that basically all of Bretonnia is unfavorable environment for him, but that's only a minor annoyance.
Calling a nasty skulker crap stack a doomstack by turn 5 is quite the exaggeration. Even when you get them maxed out with all the buffs and da' biggest lizard trophy, they're still definitely not a doomstack.
4:43 for the bretonia economy I think is really good , you can get 800 gold per settlement with a couple tier 3 economic buildings and some tech tree , their economy is busted in my opinion
As it should be, their units are really quite expensive. Grail Guardians cost only about ~500 less and ~150 less upkeep than a Rogue Idol, and you almost never bring a single Grail Guardian unit.
Their economy needs to be one of the strongest, because they build yheir armies around extremely expensive units, whereas other races' core armies usually comprised of units that rarely cost more than 1k recruitment cost.
@@НазарУкраїнець-щ1я If you remember to use their faction mechanic you have them 50% cheaper. (youtube ai is super dumb, it deleted my previous comment because its terrible at reading context)
When he said Malakai in A would be contentious I thought it would be cause people would say he was S tier. I didn’t know people struggled with him early on, you can literally just leave and go wherever with him if you need to.
Malekith being an A tier would make alot more sense in my opinion. He's an ok battle lord but he's a great campaign lord and his perks helps out the DE alot
@@ATEN_DNAR while it's strong you can't afford more than 2 armies in the beginning and Malakai have probably the most enemies around his starting location out of all factions. I was in 4 wars already around round 15 (Wulfrik, Throg, Daniel, Epdiemious) and those 2 armies were not enough against 4 armies Wulfrik had, for every settlememt taken, he would reconquer some other one. I was running around Norsca for 30 turns, trying to conquer him, but he always had more armies. And then Skaven attecked from the east. Dealing with many wars at the same time is the biggest challenge as Malakai.
Grand Cathay at B is interesting to say the least. I'm new to the game and can sometimes struggle with normal difficulty, but with all Cathay factions i can do legendary, very hard battle difficulty, AI max cheats without even trying. Many of the S tier factions are not so easy. At least for me. i suppose its all about knowing how to play them, to make them good. But as for a beginner, i found Cathay easy.
He’s put Juan Bo at A. I think legends lists are made with how quickly and powerful he can use them to paint the map. Not based on how easy a race/faction is to play. I play Dwarves on legendary / VH but it doesn’t mean they’re stronger than say Khorne. Even tho I batter Khorne with dwarves, legend could paint the map much faster with khorne than dwarves. Hope that makes sense, because I get what you’re saying but it’s not the metric in what these lists are built on…. I think
Cathay is a turtle faction. If you're good with them, you'll achieve the same success with dwarfs or high elves. Sit and shoot with solid frontline can win most battles without issues. Cathay has the one advantage of being completely boxed in after consolidating their part of the map. There are like 4 ways into cathay (and the wall), but those are very easy to defend, allowing you to build up technology and landmarks with ease.
problem with S tier is that it's dominated by unga-bunga factions like Chaos and Beastmen, and niches like Vcounts wind of death comps or Ikit firing lines, that on VH/VH have to play specific styles and trade EXTREMELY favorably in combat in order to win a long term campaign. You're better off trying to find success with A-B tier factions that have more conventional styles (more straightforward to win with) until you have a bit more experience with the game and can pull of the stronger niche faction styles.
Cathay’s problem is that, once you take care of Eshin and the Blessed Dread, *anyone* can dominate with them. With the exception of Yuan Bo (and even then, he can ally with the Huntsmarshal and Bretonnians) Cathay is the easiest place to conquer and control AND hold in the whole game. It’s super safe but once you take it all you’re kind of stuck there.
24:10 It also was a godsend that people can't declare war on vassals anymore in WH3. Now they *have* to declare war on you directly, and if they do, you can opt not to drag your vassals in.
Honestly, the most recent one is pretty fun. Lots of fun to be had with the Empire and Dwarfs. The Warriors of Chaos DLC is another cool one for the changes to the faction. I still find myself only playing Belakor for his portals, but the faction itself is honestly really fun to play in WH3 compared to WH2. I still haven't purchased Shadows of Change yet because I only want it for the Cathay stuff. So I can't speak much on that.
@@Duke_of_Lorraine In one of my campaigns, Ghrond destroyed Har Ganeth, then moved over to Naggarond and destroyed Malekith's faction, then moved North and conquered Valkia. They dominated half of Naggarond for almost 100 turns until I came over to say hello.
i would love a minor factions tier list from this channel. i really appreciate how he actually explains each faction’s ranking unlike other shit tier list total war youtubers
I'd like to be Daniel protector here so: when you give Daniel points into relations with evil guys. It's only Malakai who is going to hate you. Malus needs 1 settlement to be your buddy for life. So his campaign is really chill if you do this.
im a huge fan of ghorst's campaign so maybe im biased but i'd argue tor blue roses to be S tier because they make zombies a really strong unit that can take on almost anything and with how cheep and abundant they are you can make a ton of armies really easily and dominate any faction that lacks really good artillery
Blue Roses is the best Vampire faction by far, I'm not sure when he last played them but unkillable zombie spam is something the AI can't handle at all and you dominate the world easily. The only downside if you care about such things is they forgot to change his victory conditions when they moved him from Sylvania so he still has to wipe out the Empire which is a bit annoying as you start nowhere near them.
Just for the mention of discussion Legend, I believe having that extra convoy at the beginning is a *huge* boost for Zhatan the Black. Having the ability to just immediately receive huge swaths of laborers, along with powerful magic items from successful trades provides him with a huge jump start in the early game. Likewise, the fact that it takes many, many dedicated turns of research to unlock another convoy (or getting a specific mid-tier council seat) means that Zhatan is consistently going to be flooded with outside resources throughout the campaign.
I think the other Wood Elves have an easier time of it than you give them credit for. You don't care about anything that isn't a heathland settlement or trade resource, but that just means you can sell them to AI that do for diplomacy points and cash money. Sack it, take it, get your turn of replenishment, then sell it to a neutral third party and roll on to the next one, same as you can with Nakai's vassal.
Skarbrand technically the strongest LL in the game. The problem i have with him after playing multiple campaigns, its just the battle burnout. You ust fight like 100 battles in first 25 turns which is insane. Its the strongest faction but imo one of the most annoying to play.
Honestly, I think Imrik belong in B tier, or even C tier, for a few reasons: 1. You are fully surrounded by enemies right on your borders, Chaos Dwarfs to your North, Vampires and Nurgle to your East, and Skaven to your West. 2. You also basically have no friends to trade with until you confederate Caledor, which means your economy sucks for a decent chunk of the early game. 3. Finally, his territory is super large, meaning it takes him forever to march from A to B and leaves him dangerously exposed to AI factions randomly declaring war.
As a regular DE player, i can say they are for the most part of them s tier factions. PO is no longer an issue, if you well manage your slaves, you keep a small PO bonus. Malekith bring many bonuses here and has the possibility to get 100 PO provinces which consume 0 slave per turn. You don't really need lockear to recrut a lot of darck arch, if you save a few of them in previous campain you can just hire them all in the next game after the first rite. Recruitment is a bit low in early, but now beastmaster bonuses work with black arch which means hydras armies in few turn and its insane. Diktat and slave construction just rock and make things quicker. You now can align so many heroes and key building early its insane. Few weakness but nothing really impactfull. Malekith is weak in early game and cav sucks. Period.
I think Legend needs to play Sartosa and make Sartosa Free Company Doomstacks. They are a very underrated unit, being as cheap as a tier 1 unit, but having perfect vigor, vanguard deployment and anti infantry, they scale very well into the late game. Sartosa is on the same tier as the others because of Free Companies, Coast having good melee infantry before depth guard makes a huge difference
A bit late to the party, I guess. 1) I would probably dump Malus into C tier, since all his faction mechanics are nerfs. Likewise with Hellebrond. 2) I would put Malakai in S-tier because hero spam, super-cannons, gyrocopters, and very early access to a thunderbarge summon is ridiculously good. 3) I think Skaven are a bit overrated. I don't think Ikit deserves S-tier. Sure, the nuke, but it isn't a reliable weapon for all armies in every battle. Sure, the workshop, but it takes a while to get every upgrade and even then your upgraded units aren't quite deleting their targets. You have to work your tail off to keep those weapon's team armies from getting overrun and that has to count down some. As for Moulder, I don't think your early game is all that strong and I don't think the lab really snowballs in the late game, so that is another strong A tier rather than S-tier. 4) Slaanesh is painful early but the devotee armies are free and don't degrade as long as you have full corruption. That means insane faction strength. And you'll eventually gift the the Elves into submission and turn them into loyal vassals as well. Done right, the snowballing is ridiculous. I reckon A-tier is probably justified. 5) Kairos in C-tier feels off. Yeah, it's a fairly slow'ish start but good grief, do you explode later on. Particularly with all the legendary hero nonsense you're also getting at this point. Top of B-tier, possibly even A-tier, IMO. But then I really, really like my Kairos-cheese. Also, murdering the dinos isn't that hard. Krog really wanted to be at war with me but I never let him until I was ready. What's that, you didn't get the memo that we're at peace? So sorry, mate. Kairos with a quick visit to Yuan Bo is so good. 6) VCoast... I don't think they're all that good anymore. Their economy is pretty bad, their legendary pirates are cool but having enough money for upgrading those, and settlements, and building armies is difficult, and their regular pirate lords are rubbish. And now that the AI isn't happily taking the bait and letting itself getting mortar-blasted to death, there's just not as many good things to say about VCoast. B for Noctilus, C for the rest, IMO.
Giving Khalida 1 somewhat friendly (or at least neutral) neighbour and maybe a bonus to AP on missile units (kinda like what our sneaky lil rat has) and her campaign would be alot more playable. And maybe they could add another missile unit to the tomb king roster for bonus points.
The thing I found with Ursus is, that you don't need supporters anyway. The other Kislev factions die long before you find them and the good thing about fighting Archeon so early, is that once he's dead, you can really snowball.
Agreed, full healing an army, making an army able to stalk and ambush like Skaven or giving them full movement again is busted. I wouldn't be surprised if some of them get their turn cooldowns extended and a reduction modifier added to research instead.
I think Gelt not being in S tier is not an issue of him not being strong enough, because he does get ridiculous, however everyone else on S tier gets their game breaking bullshit either right at the start of their campaign or very early on, and with Gelt it takes you almost into the mid game to run around with your wizard army, while Skarbrand wins the campaign by turn 10 and Ikkit Claw has nukes right from the start
I feel like the best way to define B tier in this list is that B tier factions have a Stable Growth Rate. They don’t conquer too fast or slow, it’s just right for the average player. The Baby Bear of the tiers.
I was one of those people who thought Malakai's early game was hella hard, til Legend pointed out how well the Stalk armor interacts with Gyrocopter stacks. Now I just capture the province with the starting army while the gyro building is constructing. Between the one you start with, normal, and adventure recruitment, you can have 13 units worth by turn 6, and easily steamroll through the region.
If people bored or has problems with some factions because of their start positions and surrounding enemies they can try randomized start positions mod. It can bring a totally new expirience of the campaing. Starting Boris in Naggaroth or Demon prince in Cathay is very refreshing.
Kahlida has by far the worst starting enemies with dwarves and lizardmen yet she has nothing but her cav which is heavily countered by both of them early on... Her start is hellish and if you're not fast enough Skarbrand or the skavens will add to your problems. Ah a'd you start on a minor settlement as well... Seriously just tell us not to play her it would be faster. A shame because she's a really cool design.
I have a Rapanse campaign going and I use infantry from outposts to round out my armies. It would be nice to see Bretonnia get an update so they have some viable late game units besides cavalry, paladins, and footsquires.
Hard disagree on Kugath, post rework he is an absolute beast and easily better than any chaos warrior faction. Thanks to his increased chance for blessed symptoms youre almost always gonna have access to boosted income/reduced upkeep plagues so your economy is going to be absolutely ridiculous, meaning youll always have the cash to instantly spit out full health stacks if anything should approach. Nurgles tech tree after the rework is very good, with solid, useful boosts to all units. His nurgling buffs being global means you can easily drown people in cheap trash stacks that can punch above their weight. In the late game, you are instantly recruiting full stacks of rank 7+ units, for free or almost free depending on your infrastructure with very little need to build up a recruitment base, how does that make for a weak faction? Highly recommend giving him another shot, hes definitely one of the most OP factions I've played once the ball gets rolling, which it does fairly early.
Thr changeling its a pretty good starting faction bc you can get used to a combination of range/melee units, beasts and diplomacy and doest matter what you do even if u fked up you never lose, good faction to learn about WH mechanics
I played as Khatep (Exiles of Nehek) and just ran around with 8 liche priests, 2 Caskets of Souls, 2 Screaming Skull Catapaults, and the rest Great Bows and Sepulcher Stalkers. Nothing could touch me. 0 casualties every battle. His liche priests get crazy boosts.
gonna argue about Kairos, recently completed a long campaign with him and once you get force peace and his skill which reduces changing of the ways cooldowns by 3 turns pretty much no one can touch you if you don't want them to, was fighting across Lustria with clan pestilens as my vassal while fighting Kroq gar and keeping tiq taq to, Thorek and Settra at bay with force peace for fewer grimoires than I was making in a turn, already miss the ability to get a faction to leave me alone playing any other faction.
Fantastic as always Legend!! I think you should start adding the version update (5.1) in each title so they never feel “out of date” but rather reflecting whatever version of the game was up by the time the tier list was uploaded!
Isabella became a LL in one of my campaigns without any of my influence. How did the AI do that and how can I replicate it? It was great being able to farm regen again.
for malakai my tip if you have a difficult time is to take advantage of that he is a horde and relocate I sack my way to silver pinnacle and finish that legendary grudge since you get cash from fighting and a ton of XP I do abuse the auto resolve and ambush stance it might not work if you manually fight every battle.
I know Kislev struggle with starting location (especially Boris) but I kinda of really like the lore of how they are supposed to be the main human faction constantly holding back the powers of Chaos from the north (much like Cathay). And it’s always just this constant slog to hold them all off and push em back. It just feels right.
I played 2000 hours with Nurgle before update and 200h after it, most of it with Ku’gath. After update, he can everywhere recruit units for free at lvl9! -80% maintenance costs and 60% resistens against missles for all armies in one province. Defending your own cities is super easy because of immediate recruitment at full health. From my experience he belongs to the "S" (you need to confederate Tamurkhan for -80% maintenance costs and if you du that correctly you will get all his heros) (confederate Epidemius to get -90% maintenance and 70% resistens for him) Tip: Ku’gath Perfekt Plague is +30Armor +20%MissleRessitence -30%maintenance costs, switch that one Perfekt Plague between you armees to have it forever!
I never thought Total War series made this day for having almost a hundred factions in trilogy fantasy series, more than Medieval, Empire, Shogun2, Rome2, Attila and Three Kingdoms sequels combined
I've always thought Malus is ridiculously powerful by being able to be a 1 person doomstack to get your empire started and then move to massive growth once you have some territory which for me made it one of the easiest campaigns. Really recommend the old world campaign as well with him as really fun.
Played Grom some weeks ago. Had mostly lower Goblin spear stuff with shields, and dominated south Bretonnia AND Athel Loren before Turn 20. Regeneration for the Gobbos, Shields on them, and Unbreakable for the few trolls, and DAMN those tiny Greenskins bombed through the Enemy Armies and Settlements. Okay i did most of this during my first WAAARGH, but it was worth it. But i only played on very hard not legendary.. so yeah.
the waagh is the most op thing here. Grom can have three armies very early with cheap units and with a waagh at that time, there is no amry on the map, that can mess with him. They shuld allow waag earliest at turn 20 or so, than it would be maybe another story.
I just played my second campaign ever as Nakai. He is a snowball. You get him going, he can support more insanely strong units than anyone else since your vassels give you so much money
He is S tier in my opinion. An absurdly strong melee lord with steroids for units that are already strong. Super good tech tree and the biggest total movement distance i have ever seen in this game once you have access to the temple buff.
Another thing that makes Norsca so strong is they have great army stances. It makes a big difference. Definitely want a Rot Blood and / or Skegi Norsca DLC.
I think I disagree with not putting nagarythe in S tier. You have high elf income, ambush attack and underway stance and high elf units. The campaign is a breeze to get a short victory for and since you eliminate the delves, they almost never land on the donut giving you ulthuan for free.
In the future, would it be possible to sort factions within tiers according to their respective power compared to the other factions in the tier? For example, I think you should have put Gelt as the first faction within A tier if you felt they were the strongest A tier faction.
Is archaon a powerful enemy? in all my campaigns i've played in the last 3 months he just has literally 1 settlement and only his starting army for the entire campaign until I eventually come over and kill him.
Also I think you've completely underrated Drycha, but that's another long writeup that I don't have the energy to do right now. Just know that Drycha can essentially get free upkeep on Tree Spirits, while also drowning in gold which allows you to easily pick up Elf/Beast/Allied Faction units. I'm also kind of shocked that you rated the Vampire Counts so highly when they fall of a damn cliff in the mid/late game. They're easily one of the least impressive armies at this point. Anyway, sorry for expressing only my disagreements - I think you did a great job overall and I appreciate the dedication and work it took to put this list together.
Can you do an allied recruitment tier list? As in what factions benefit most from it maybe with particular units most likely to be available from factions they can ally with easier or harder
With Boris I like to retreat back to Praag then build up from there. It allows you to get a couple province under your belt before taking on Archeon. If you're lucky Katarin has been stomped making an easy confed.
Never really get why Brettonia are so underrated, like I get they are not the best but one of my favourite campaigns in the game is Repanse. She herself as a lord is an absolute beast, she provides some good buffs and outside of Taurox or Skarbrand, for me at least, has been the campaign where i've destroyed most of the rest of the world in double quick time
Ghorst is by far and wide the strongest Vampire count faction, if not one of the top 3 faction in the entire game. His zombies are so absurdly strong that each army is basically a doom stack even when facing late game armies. You can expand so quickly, your armies cost 500-1000 gold and are virtually unkillable.
It’s pretty hard to argue that strong zombies make him top 3 when Skarbrand can conquer the entire map in 10 turns, Taurox isn’t super far behind, and the changeling can literally do whatever he wants across the map with no risk whatsoever. Also, talsyn can get similar upkeep armies with actual elite units, cult of sotek can build for free and get infinite money, and skaven are skaven. Ghorst may be strong, but he’s nowhere near the level of those factions and his start position is pretty meh.
@@Loj84 Have you played Caravan of the Blue Roses? They can spam a near unlimited number of nigh unkillable doom stacks starting at turn 10. Their armies don't take recruitment time, nearly no upkeep and are fully capable of taking on 3-4 end game armies. Skarbrand and Taurox take a very specific strategy to pull off their early turn full map conquests. A nearly brain dead player with a zombie army can 1v1 ANY thing the computer can throw at them. I'm not discounting either of those faction, Ghrost faction just ranks among them and certain above the other Vampire counts. Talsyn and Sotek require recruitment time and their armies aren't generally going to be nearly as strong as a single zombie stack, but for every 1 army either of those factions can make Ghorst is putting out 5-6 stronger armies. Skaven are skaven, but their armies require upkeep, recruitment time and some planning and strategy to use. Caravan of the blue Rose doesn't have that bad of a starting location. Cathay and the Dark Lands are easily expanded into. Nothing the AI can build in the first 100 turns can kill a stack of zombies, literally every battle is a win.
I would actually put Aranessa Saltspite one tier higher. While it is true that the units she boosts specifically are only useful in the early game, she herself has a decent skill tree and is a welcome change from the actual undead lords. Furthermore, her special trait gives her extra cash for every sea location, even the ones that don't give you a battle will give you 7500 gold extra, all the time, everywhere. The start location doesn't really matter for Vampire Coast factions anyway, but her start is close to Ikit Claw which means you can get the defeat trait very early on. The dwarfs and the greenskins are constantly at war with each other, giving you some potential room to breath and/or get on good terms with the dwarfs for a while and if Khemri wins in the desert to the South you can make them your allies pretty easily as well. And then it is all smooth sailing from there, if you catch my drift.
So i just wanted to add something to this tier list. I think Tyrion is definitely S tier. I realize he doesn't have magic. But my god he's so goddamn powerful in mele. The wizard he starts with is pretty good too. Heavens is highly under-rated. The thing about Tyrion is that the Phoenix is an incredible starting unit to get. The Silver Helms w/ Shields are also VERY under-rated. But most of all, his economy is BONKERS! 50% off on upkeep for virtually every unit you would ever put in your starting army. And he can basically out duel anyone. Find a smart balance between your spell line and getting plus magic item drop chance with your wizard. Tyrion is S tier. There is NO DOUBT that they made the game harder with patch 5.2. It's MUCH harder. I have actually struggled with certain campaigns since this past update. But not Tyrion. Playing as Tyrion is a joke! Its quite fun actually.
I would put Malakai into S-tier, because his adventure rewards are ridiculously OP, just four canons alone can decimate most armies, but i found that while malakai is unbeatable, its kinda hard to hold territory with other armies, its quite space up there on map and you have enemies on three fronts basically, so while malakai is on his trip having fun, the rest of his territory is in pain. I agree with rest.
Thanks to MANSCAPED for sponsoring today's video! Get 20% OFF + Free International Shipping with my link manscaped.com/legendoftotalwar
My balls have never been smoother.
"You basically have to stay on edge for the entirety of your campaign with Slaanesh"
Ah, yes, Slaanesh. The edging faction.
it truly befits the lord of excess
Aww yeah 😉
this comment is living rent free in my head for the past 3 days
The original edgemaxxer
Yeah it's just weird that Throt edges on Wulfrik... (0_0)
Timestamps to find your favorite races:
1:13 - Rating criteria
2:14 - Beastmen (x1 S Tier faction)
3:36 - Bretonnia
5:15 - Chaos Dwarves
6:50 - Daniel the Demon Prince
7:42 - Dark Elves
10:04 - Dwarves
12:42 - Empire
14:43 - Cathay
16:06 - Greenskins
17:30 - High Elves
18:57 - Kislev
21:43 - Lizardmen (x1 S Tier faction)
25:42 - Norsca
27:39 - Nurgle
29:29 - Ogres
30:36 - Skaven (x3 S Tier factions, no surprise)
33:23 - Slaanesh
34:13 - Khorne (x1 S Tier faction)
36:06 - Tzeentch (x1 S Tier faction)
38:20 - Tomb Kings
40:55 - Vampire Coast
42:34 - Vampire Counts (x1 S Tier faction)
45:53 - Warriors of Chaos (x2 S Tier factions)
48:05 - Wood Elves (x1 S Tier faction)
49:07 - Final list and closing thoughts
Thank you so much ❤❤❤
The real MVP
Thank you
what is between skaven and khorne?
@@fabisto5693Slaanesh, missed one. Lotta races in the game lol
"The Changeling's campaign is over once you stop being a dick."
Well it might be boring, but at least they got the flavour of it right.
I think the uniqueness is fun. That campaign shouldn't be approached in the same way as others. That been said, I hope we get some other FLC for Tzeench to balance that out.
No, complete flavor fail!
... Changeling never gets tired of being a dick.
I feel Changeling's campaign would be alot more fun if they randomized his start position.
@@whytho1637 Random start locations mod ftw
@@joedrewett8042 I can't find a mod that randomizes ONLY the changeling's start position.
Honestly for almost 100 factions they kinda managed to balance it out. Even if not perfectly, I'd say that is definitely an achievement.
Yeah but is "balanced" really what we want? I am not saying it's fun if X faction destroys all others with no issue, but some factions has always been more or less unbalanced.
@@NielsMulvad Yes, the challenge of some faction should definitely made part of their campaign. I haven't played them in over a year, but Clan Angrund was one of the hardest, but most fun campaign. But, they should all allowed to become strong.
I mean, Tyrion is just boring mode, kicking easy enemies time and time again, at least it was when I last played.
Actually all factions are overpowered. Some more and some less. Because that's what most players want. Reaching this Moment where you just dominate and roll over your enemies. It shouldn't be too easy but the players still can't be balanced for this. We wouldn't stand a chance against a real intelligent KI.
@@spierchen2052 I hear what you are saying, but that is not what anyone mean when they say overpowered.
Being overpowered is not when a faction performs better when a player uses them, nor when we build optimized doom stacks. Overpowered is when you make spartan hoplites in Rome:TotalWar and they can tank 4 other units. (enhancing the performance to hammer the meaning home).
If every faction is overpowered, then none of them are. They would be perfectly balanced, which would be boring and remove the flavor of most of the campaigns. Rather having some really strong factions, and some really weak, both in terms of unit rooster, the start location, economical possibility's and the tech. Well that is where the flavor of TW games starts to really shine.
Good call 👍
If Deathmaster Snikch has a million Gutter Runners(Poison), I'm one of them
If Deathmaster Snikch has 5 Gutter Runners(Poison), I'm one of them
If Deathmaster Snikch has 1 Gutter Runners(Poison), that one is me
If Deathmaster Snikch has no units, I'm no longer alive
If every skaven is against Deathmaster Snikch I'm against every skaven
Till my last point of health (50 per model), I'll support Deathmaster Snikch
True loyalty to the clan, yes-yes!
This is the Eshin Creed. Disobey, and you will be dispatched accordingly.
Skavenslaves should take note.
Enough is enough! I have had it with these motherfcking Rats on this motherfcking Map!
Always found it fitting that in a game called Total War, the strongest faction is Khorne, who clearly adores that concept.
I think all boris really needs for his campaign is the option to return to Kislev early on, so you choose either a chaos waste campaign or a regular Kislev campaign. As well as, involvement in the Kislev confederation mechanics with options to get both katarin and Constaltin. Those 2 simple changes would make his campaign a lot more…bear…able
As is, I like him the best of the Kislev LLs, but I have to migrate back to Kislev. Legend gave a blueprint in his review of the campaign way back, on how to get back to Kislev and have an actual campaign.
I'd honestly prefer an expedition mechanic like Wulfhart has, allowing for the recruitment of units instantly in times of need, along with some dilemmas and potential bonuses based on your choices. I really like this side of Wulfhart's mechanics,I wouldn''t mind seeing it implemented for other factions with an expeditionary feel to them
@@unmeclambda5837 It feels like Boris has a different approach, it's not an expedition it's a suicide mission, for him or for chaos. He is the cavalry, no one is coming
It got rough for me this past campaign because I defeated 1 Kislev Lord and the turn after all of Kislev basically confederated and moved all their armies together. I had to wear them down with multiple armies rushing through their territory sacking and razing settlements until my allies could move in for some decisive kills.
I’m addicted to your tierlists , please do one-man-doomstack tierlist!
Or even better, a tierlist of his previous tierlists!
Yes, do a one man doomstack tierlist.
@@CodeineTuttiFrutti He already did that before. Dont want to beat the joke to death.
One man doomstacks are really just "legendary lord power" tierlists. Which he's already done.
@@booradley6832 its not a "one man doomstack tierlist" because he rate the lords based on various criteria: combat, buffs on the company map, and the faction in general.
Legends favorite phrase today defenitely was "Project their power"
Imagine if they can project their power from a hill 🥵
He's been playing EU4 I bet
But he didn't use it with talking about Lokhir... Who I think is the epitome of projecting their power... Using the Black Arks to dominate the map.
I thought it was Project leaks for new viewers?
That sponsor segment was crazy
He should also use the opportunity to pretend Manscaped is used by Total War LLs. Do the dwarves use it?
Nurgle balls
To be fair, I love the body scrubber 😂
The clapped cheeks had me rolling
It's obviously a Slaanesh add!
I don't mind the different factions being stronger or weaker, the lore is that some factions are absolute monsters and other barely hanging on and it gives you options to play as under dog or just as a steamroller - would not want them to perfectly balance everything
The only thing that should be done is making sure both ends of the stick are fun/unique to play regardless of the challenge level
The game devs calling The Empire a "begining faction" is like calling Dark Souls "babys first game." Yeah they're powerful, but it's beyond painful
The only reson why the Empire is recomended as a starter faction is becouse of how insanely popular it is rather then actually being a good starter faction. The imperial authority mechanic is by far less punishing then it was in WH2 but your still pretty mutch have enemys coming at u from every direction and what desides how miserable your early game is gonna be is dependent on how good or bad the elector counts desides to play. In my latest try i hade the Beastmen coming from the NE, Vampires from the E, Greenskins from the W and the goblins from the SW mountains all of them pretty mutch acted like they hade a military alliance from turn 5 and by turn 15 they all hade a full stack each that were attacking. It was absurd, recomended for new ppl hell no.
A little more justifiable with nuln being as crazy as it is
Once you've learnt the glory of early game free company, even life against Vlad becomes manageable
@@blugger I'm struggling, I've had 3 rounds in the last few days, and between Chaos in the North, undead in the South, Orks in the South, North, and West, and an the dreaded Wood Elves I am feeling like it's a harder struggle then lore for 40k and Fantasy combined. It's both glorious and frustrating. I've got a feeling the developers are trying to push people away from the Empire. But I've had a taste of the brick wall, and it is delicious.
@@TyllerBoom as nuln, I've generally started rolling once as I get the province directly south of the capitol
There, soon as I get the garden quest (which will refund most of the cost of building one) and grab the halb + ebon + mortar recruit building, I'm largely set
2-3 ebon knights with free company accompaniment is basically GG.
Will still struggle a little with vlad's first army, because his harem is ridiculous and might bleed you hard enough to get overwhelmed by his nigh insta respawn, but after wards I just rolled south through some GG no re ogres, greenskins, and coast.
FCM are so ESSENTIAL to playing against Vlad early because just about nothing else has a prayer against him and his flying harem. Plus, they'll also defeat anything short of black knights, with just a bit of micro, while not folding to dang zombies like xbows
Plus, I think there are ways to rush out the emperor's wrath STANK but I don't know how it goes.
Bro Dark Souls is easy as hell. It's the controls and overall clunckiness make it look hard
Drycha is incredibly strong if you turn to order and ally with the empire factions to start. The "most settlements are shit for woodelves" issue is solved if you just don't care about owning them and instead run around taking settlements and selling them to allies. It turns your allies into massive meat shields and nets you ridiculous money. You're basically Nakai the wanderer except Karl Franz is your vassal. Once you're on good terms with order factions, all the other Order factions will want to be your friend as well. Most will even pay to be so. Which means that you can teleport into Cathay, or Orins camp, murder the current occupants of the trees, and pay or be paid by the nearby cathayans/lizardmen for a quick alliance and resolve a war in like 2 turns.
"But you're missing out on so much land that way" Who cares, it's shit land. If you owned every settlement in the game, 90% of your income would still be coming from the magical forests (Wood elves have crazy good economy buildings). You earn more money from the rest of the land by looting it from an enemy, waiting a turn if your army needs to recover, then selling it to some idiot high elf for a trade agreement or a few turns of their income, then coming back to repeat the process after they lose the settlement again to orcs.
Wooooo 96 factions is crazy
I feel like, having a A+ and B+ tier would have been pretty useful for this list.
Whic will make the 100th LL one of the next DLC ones now that I think about it.
Yeah, despite the game not being in the best of states, the amount of content is undeniable
In a few months, it will be 100 factions. Interested to see who they pick to release as the 100th.
Yeah I will say, the sheer amount of content in the game is pretty crazy now. 96 of em plus minors, wild
Khalida's campaign start location is absolute hell
also, hot take: I think Cylostra is the second most powerful vampirates lord, but I have a feeling people underrate her because they don't want to hear her voice lol
I don't think that's a hot take, but rather a fact. Luthor's campaign is worse because of his position, as the vampire coast is bad against lizardmen and bretonia
@@Slicer_ bretonia just really obliterate vampirates
Luthor is the most powerful as he can become a one man doomstack but he definitely has a bad start location compared to Cylostra. Dreadfleet are overrated, he's not a strong lord at all. I'd say in terms of strength Luthor is the best then Cylostra then Noctilus and Aranessa isn't even in the same league. I'm surprised Legend didn't put her in D as she is a terrible commander and a terrible fighter, she gets the worst mount in the game and nothing about her works as a vampire coast faction. The start position is all that saves her from oblivion.
@@Lones555 I disagree with most of what you're saying. Noctilus and the dreadfleet are definitely best, Luthor being a one-man doomstack sometimes is fun but not super powerful and he's not that good of a one-man-doomstack comparatively. Also this might be the actual hot take here but I think Aranessa and her faction are better than Luthor. I think Luthor is the worst vampirate lord/faction. Aranessa isn't great but she gives good buffs to solid early game units which helps create a strong campaign's foundation. The theory of "win more" is relevant here I think, where in some games some abilities, items, units etc have powerful effects but by the time you get to use them you already won, and thus, they are "win more" effects, allowing you to win even harder a game you already won, rather than bring you from a point of struggling into a win.
Just moving her start position to Lahmia, not a minor settlement in the same province, will greatly improve her campaign. I tend to play isolated factions (but not too isolated like Khateph) allowing me to fight more enemies, level up faster, and grow bigger without worrying about diplomacy all too much, and she would've been a perfect candidate for me to play if it wasn't for the start position
I don’t know what it is about tier list videos but I love them. I can’t get enough of them. You could do them every patch and I’d still watch them all.
or in the description perhaps.. doing it in the title might spoof some youtube algorithm ooga booga vibes or something lol
Norsca may lack content or modern mechanics, but Throgg and Wulfrik are still amazing and Throgg giving his entire army immunity to all forms of attrition makes so many army compositions he leads super effective, not just mass Trolls.
You really need to make A+ category also as A category is wild af
Google "Bell curve standard deviation" and you'll get your answer of why that isnt necessary.
Nah, he needs to stop overrating everything. Ridiculous that his S tier is bigger than his C tier
@Project0061 When you factor in minor factions it makes sense. Most D tier and C tier factions struggle because of the major factions they have to deal with. Most S tier and A tier factions propel themselves off the backs of minor factions early game. When you factor in how few major factions are actually problematic, you'll find way more steamroller campaigns compared to struggle campaigns.
Grimgor in B tier seems kind crazy to me, he honestly felt really insane when I played him. Loved the tier list either way!
Yeah I haven't played Grimgor in about 2 years and tried a campaign with him recently and it was a steamroll.
Personally Grimgor is a A tier but I understand that being surrounded by Chaos and Ogres might not be best place to start. But I am mostly surprised that Wurrzag is a B tier cuz he got like... crazy early Savage Orcs that are really deadly on the beginning.
B tier is strong. Grimgor can "steamroll" but that was done through exploits like taking the T5 Chaos Dwarf capital by turn 2 or by trait farming the Nurgle lord up north.
The exploit was fixed and the Nurgle defeat trait was nerfed into uselessness.
Grimgor doesn't have any strong global buffs or faction effects besides Black Orc Warbosses. Because of that, Grom just has by default much stronger armies. Grimgor doesn't even buff his own army's black orcs enough. He has a strong starting position and potential big confederations later but that's all he has going for him. Legend gave him and the rest B tier for the same reason Grom got A tier - because he's not including exploitation within the criteria.
@@somber8233 Correct. I think a lot of people are reminiscing past experiences with a faction (that no longer apply to the current state of the game), thinking of how they are as individual fighting lord, or even how annoying they are to deal with when playing as a different faction. Legend is trying to define, without exploits - though ease of exploitation is a factor - how quickly a faction can express and rise to dominant power.
Grimgor is only better than Azhag in Greenskin terms, the other faction leaders are so far above him. I think B is high for Grimgor, I'd put him in C with Azhag in D. Skarsnik and Wurrzag in A and Grom in S. If you want to do a legendary playthrough with the Greenskins Grom's campaign is a cakewalk (provided the wandering hag mechanic works as it tends to break every time the game patches forcing you to restart the campaign).
I feel if all of Boris' armies were immune to chaos attrition and not just him it'd be a lot easier to expand in the wastes. It wouldn't make him a S tier powerhouse but it'd get him out of D tier at the minimum. Expanding is difficult when you lose units every turn unless you always give up range to encamp
Hellebron is A tier imo. The buff to witch elves + that blood voyage + the increase to slaves + op sacrifice rite + more hags is A tier worthy in my exp. She bodies all her nearby enemies even though the Valkia battle is hard. Interested to see if anyone agrees or disagrees
Disagree because Valkia is right next to her, making the fight with her inevitable also witch elves and sisters of Slaughter are countered by Warriors/Chosen of Khorne(duel axes). If she were anywhere else on the map, she would arguably be the best DE Lord
Har Ganeth is the best Dark Elf faction. Its merely an issue of always being forced to attack and expand with them which hampers the experience. Who rests rusts. Especially true with Hellebron.
Hellebron is strong because Dark Elfs in general are really strong as a baseline. I’m with you in that I don’t think the Naggaroth start is as bad as Legend says but it is objectively a harder than normal situation with Valkia and Sigvald at your door.
Appreciate the responses. I agree with the difficult starting area with Valkia and Sigvald. I totally forgot that Daniel beelines straight for you too!! Gonna start a new campaign this afternoon 😁
Valkia is def the thing holding Hellebron back now. The campaign is a lot more of a slog than I remember it being.
17:10 What do you mean, the moment you get nasty skulkers you won the Campaign. Grom's cauldron buffs are so strong that by turn 5 you have a gobbo unbeatable doomstack
I was about to use this same justification for skarskink. -40% upkeep on gobbos is nuts, especially with wag mechanics. Orcs are overrated
My greenskin ranking:
S: Grom and Skarskink
A: Grimgor and Wurzag
B: Azag
Legend did say that he didn't know the other person was doing so well. So maybe he's just unaware?
Yeah all of Grom's goblin buffs are a bit bonkers, and as far as just getting his short and long victory goals, they're surprisingly easy, especially with how bad the AI appears to be at dealing with Morathi, Noctilus, and even Cylostra. In about 70% of my games the High Elves just get mopped by some combination of those 3. He essentially turns regular goblin spears into Silverin Guard equivalent units, and then you add Cauldron buffs on top. The only thing I dislike about his early game is that basically all of Bretonnia is unfavorable environment for him, but that's only a minor annoyance.
He’s got a few glaring blind spots here; empire being ranked stronger than greenskins is one for the most wildly inaccurate things
Calling a nasty skulker crap stack a doomstack by turn 5 is quite the exaggeration. Even when you get them maxed out with all the buffs and da' biggest lizard trophy, they're still definitely not a doomstack.
4:43 for the bretonia economy I think is really good , you can get 800 gold per settlement with a couple tier 3 economic buildings and some tech tree , their economy is busted in my opinion
As it should be, their units are really quite expensive. Grail Guardians cost only about ~500 less and ~150 less upkeep than a Rogue Idol, and you almost never bring a single Grail Guardian unit.
@@choleraphd7702 Dude, don't forget to take vows. They are really cheap if you do.
Their economy needs to be one of the strongest, because they build yheir armies around extremely expensive units, whereas other races' core armies usually comprised of units that rarely cost more than 1k recruitment cost.
@@НазарУкраїнець-щ1я If you remember to use their faction mechanic you have them 50% cheaper.
(youtube ai is super dumb, it deleted my previous comment because its terrible at reading context)
i dont see how this is busted when DE or HE make easily over 1k
I’m bored at work today and this is exactly what I wanted to see!
When he said Malakai in A would be contentious I thought it would be cause people would say he was S tier. I didn’t know people struggled with him early on, you can literally just leave and go wherever with him if you need to.
You do realise that sets you back however many turns you spent on migrating? Any turn not spent developing the economy is technically wasted.
@@mattandrews2594 But any turn not spent migrating is a turn not spent walloping some elgi scum.
Malekith being an A tier would make alot more sense in my opinion. He's an ok battle lord but he's a great campaign lord and his perks helps out the DE alot
Malakai should be S tier. Early gyrocopter spam is basically unstoppable throughout the early and mid game.
@@ATEN_DNAR while it's strong you can't afford more than 2 armies in the beginning and Malakai have probably the most enemies around his starting location out of all factions. I was in 4 wars already around round 15 (Wulfrik, Throg, Daniel, Epdiemious) and those 2 armies were not enough against 4 armies Wulfrik had, for every settlememt taken, he would reconquer some other one. I was running around Norsca for 30 turns, trying to conquer him, but he always had more armies. And then Skaven attecked from the east. Dealing with many wars at the same time is the biggest challenge as Malakai.
Grand Cathay at B is interesting to say the least. I'm new to the game and can sometimes struggle with normal difficulty, but with all Cathay factions i can do legendary, very hard battle difficulty, AI max cheats without even trying. Many of the S tier factions are not so easy. At least for me. i suppose its all about knowing how to play them, to make them good. But as for a beginner, i found Cathay easy.
theses are rated with "similar" skill level in mind. A really good dark elf player will dominate quicker then a really good cathay player
He’s put Juan Bo at A. I think legends lists are made with how quickly and powerful he can use them to paint the map. Not based on how easy a race/faction is to play. I play Dwarves on legendary / VH but it doesn’t mean they’re stronger than say Khorne. Even tho I batter Khorne with dwarves, legend could paint the map much faster with khorne than dwarves. Hope that makes sense, because I get what you’re saying but it’s not the metric in what these lists are built on…. I think
Cathay is a turtle faction. If you're good with them, you'll achieve the same success with dwarfs or high elves. Sit and shoot with solid frontline can win most battles without issues.
Cathay has the one advantage of being completely boxed in after consolidating their part of the map. There are like 4 ways into cathay (and the wall), but those are very easy to defend, allowing you to build up technology and landmarks with ease.
problem with S tier is that it's dominated by unga-bunga factions like Chaos and Beastmen, and niches like Vcounts wind of death comps or Ikit firing lines, that on VH/VH have to play specific styles and trade EXTREMELY favorably in combat in order to win a long term campaign. You're better off trying to find success with A-B tier factions that have more conventional styles (more straightforward to win with) until you have a bit more experience with the game and can pull of the stronger niche faction styles.
Cathay’s problem is that, once you take care of Eshin and the Blessed Dread, *anyone* can dominate with them. With the exception of Yuan Bo (and even then, he can ally with the Huntsmarshal and Bretonnians) Cathay is the easiest place to conquer and control AND hold in the whole game. It’s super safe but once you take it all you’re kind of stuck there.
Thanks Legend for teaching me so much about this game.
Without you i doubt i would have stayed with it for so long.
Thank you for this tier list and all other videos you keep making. Lots of useful information and entertainment in them! Greets from The Netherlands
These tier list explanations very well may be the best quality videos on TH-cam, forever a fan
24:10 It also was a godsend that people can't declare war on vassals anymore in WH3. Now they *have* to declare war on you directly, and if they do, you can opt not to drag your vassals in.
first 20 turn guide for the D tier factions would be need
the guide for the empire in ttw 3 really helped me a lot
Kinda crazy how I was just looking for this since WH3 is on the steam sale to help me pick which DLC to also prioritize. Thank you Legend!!!
Honestly, the most recent one is pretty fun. Lots of fun to be had with the Empire and Dwarfs.
The Warriors of Chaos DLC is another cool one for the changes to the faction. I still find myself only playing Belakor for his portals, but the faction itself is honestly really fun to play in WH3 compared to WH2.
I still haven't purchased Shadows of Change yet because I only want it for the Cathay stuff. So I can't speak much on that.
which dlc did you pick
@@joaopedroalves6777 had to put it on the back burner for now
Just use a DLC unlocker.. I ain't spending hundreds of dollars on a video game
Perfect timing! I'm about to start a new campaign soon.
Thank you for the fun faction tier list Legend!
Minor faction rankings when, legend?
Various degrees of getting curb stomped by major factions...
I know for a FACT I'd watch that 😅
The "who dies fastest" tierlist
@@Duke_of_Lorraine In one of my campaigns, Ghrond destroyed Har Ganeth, then moved over to Naggarond and destroyed Malekith's faction, then moved North and conquered Valkia. They dominated half of Naggarond for almost 100 turns until I came over to say hello.
i would love a minor factions tier list from this channel. i really appreciate how he actually explains each faction’s ranking unlike other shit tier list total war youtubers
I'd like to be Daniel protector here so: when you give Daniel points into relations with evil guys. It's only Malakai who is going to hate you. Malus needs 1 settlement to be your buddy for life. So his campaign is really chill if you do this.
im a huge fan of ghorst's campaign so maybe im biased but i'd argue tor blue roses to be S tier because they make zombies a really strong unit that can take on almost anything and with how cheep and abundant they are you can make a ton of armies really easily and dominate any faction that lacks really good artillery
You aren't being bias, blue rose very powerful and seems significantly underrated in the list.
Blue Roses is the best Vampire faction by far, I'm not sure when he last played them but unkillable zombie spam is something the AI can't handle at all and you dominate the world easily. The only downside if you care about such things is they forgot to change his victory conditions when they moved him from Sylvania so he still has to wipe out the Empire which is a bit annoying as you start nowhere near them.
Do a Dwarf beard texture tier list next
Morgur shadowgave with nemesis crown and native mortis engine affect might actually be a great solo doomstack now.
Just for the mention of discussion Legend, I believe having that extra convoy at the beginning is a *huge* boost for Zhatan the Black. Having the ability to just immediately receive huge swaths of laborers, along with powerful magic items from successful trades provides him with a huge jump start in the early game. Likewise, the fact that it takes many, many dedicated turns of research to unlock another convoy (or getting a specific mid-tier council seat) means that Zhatan is consistently going to be flooded with outside resources throughout the campaign.
I think the other Wood Elves have an easier time of it than you give them credit for. You don't care about anything that isn't a heathland settlement or trade resource, but that just means you can sell them to AI that do for diplomacy points and cash money. Sack it, take it, get your turn of replenishment, then sell it to a neutral third party and roll on to the next one, same as you can with Nakai's vassal.
Skarbrand technically the strongest LL in the game. The problem i have with him after playing multiple campaigns, its just the battle burnout. You ust fight like 100 battles in first 25 turns which is insane. Its the strongest faction but imo one of the most annoying to play.
Totally love your tier lists, an update of some after next patch is appreciated
Honestly, I think Imrik belong in B tier, or even C tier, for a few reasons:
1. You are fully surrounded by enemies right on your borders, Chaos Dwarfs to your North, Vampires and Nurgle to your East, and Skaven to your West.
2. You also basically have no friends to trade with until you confederate Caledor, which means your economy sucks for a decent chunk of the early game.
3. Finally, his territory is super large, meaning it takes him forever to march from A to B and leaves him dangerously exposed to AI factions randomly declaring war.
As a regular DE player, i can say they are for the most part of them s tier factions.
PO is no longer an issue, if you well manage your slaves, you keep a small PO bonus. Malekith bring many bonuses here and has the possibility to get 100 PO provinces which consume 0 slave per turn.
You don't really need lockear to recrut a lot of darck arch, if you save a few of them in previous campain you can just hire them all in the next game after the first rite.
Recruitment is a bit low in early, but now beastmaster bonuses work with black arch which means hydras armies in few turn and its insane.
Diktat and slave construction just rock and make things quicker. You now can align so many heroes and key building early its insane.
Few weakness but nothing really impactfull. Malekith is weak in early game and cav sucks. Period.
I think Legend needs to play Sartosa and make Sartosa Free Company Doomstacks. They are a very underrated unit, being as cheap as a tier 1 unit, but having perfect vigor, vanguard deployment and anti infantry, they scale very well into the late game. Sartosa is on the same tier as the others because of Free Companies, Coast having good melee infantry before depth guard makes a huge difference
Love these vids Legend, could you also update some of the unit roster tier list videos? That'd be great. All the best for your baby!
A bit late to the party, I guess.
1) I would probably dump Malus into C tier, since all his faction mechanics are nerfs. Likewise with Hellebrond.
2) I would put Malakai in S-tier because hero spam, super-cannons, gyrocopters, and very early access to a thunderbarge summon is ridiculously good.
3) I think Skaven are a bit overrated. I don't think Ikit deserves S-tier. Sure, the nuke, but it isn't a reliable weapon for all armies in every battle. Sure, the workshop, but it takes a while to get every upgrade and even then your upgraded units aren't quite deleting their targets. You have to work your tail off to keep those weapon's team armies from getting overrun and that has to count down some. As for Moulder, I don't think your early game is all that strong and I don't think the lab really snowballs in the late game, so that is another strong A tier rather than S-tier.
4) Slaanesh is painful early but the devotee armies are free and don't degrade as long as you have full corruption. That means insane faction strength. And you'll eventually gift the the Elves into submission and turn them into loyal vassals as well. Done right, the snowballing is ridiculous. I reckon A-tier is probably justified.
5) Kairos in C-tier feels off. Yeah, it's a fairly slow'ish start but good grief, do you explode later on. Particularly with all the legendary hero nonsense you're also getting at this point. Top of B-tier, possibly even A-tier, IMO. But then I really, really like my Kairos-cheese. Also, murdering the dinos isn't that hard. Krog really wanted to be at war with me but I never let him until I was ready. What's that, you didn't get the memo that we're at peace? So sorry, mate. Kairos with a quick visit to Yuan Bo is so good.
6) VCoast... I don't think they're all that good anymore. Their economy is pretty bad, their legendary pirates are cool but having enough money for upgrading those, and settlements, and building armies is difficult, and their regular pirate lords are rubbish. And now that the AI isn't happily taking the bait and letting itself getting mortar-blasted to death, there's just not as many good things to say about VCoast. B for Noctilus, C for the rest, IMO.
Finally the ultimate tier list! Thanks Legend for still posting videos even tho Baby Legend has arrived.
Giving Khalida 1 somewhat friendly (or at least neutral) neighbour and maybe a bonus to AP on missile units (kinda like what our sneaky lil rat has) and her campaign would be alot more playable. And maybe they could add another missile unit to the tomb king roster for bonus points.
Change her lord bonuses for a start, who thought +10 diplomatic relations was going to be useful as a campaign mechanic.
The thing I found with Ursus is, that you don't need supporters anyway. The other Kislev factions die long before you find them and the good thing about fighting Archeon so early, is that once he's dead, you can really snowball.
Wow, Gelt not S tier? The colleges mechanic is so strong. Expansion is one of the fastest.
Agreed, full healing an army, making an army able to stalk and ambush like Skaven or giving them full movement again is busted. I wouldn't be surprised if some of them get their turn cooldowns extended and a reduction modifier added to research instead.
I think Gelt not being in S tier is not an issue of him not being strong enough, because he does get ridiculous, however everyone else on S tier gets their game breaking bullshit either right at the start of their campaign or very early on, and with Gelt it takes you almost into the mid game to run around with your wizard army, while Skarbrand wins the campaign by turn 10 and Ikkit Claw has nukes right from the start
Its annoying that they're the strongest magic faction. Mazdamundi is like "am I a joke to you"
Just played it, and I can only agree. I probably won quicker with skarbrand and taurox, but Gelt's wizard blob felt literally impossible to lose with
I feel like the best way to define B tier in this list is that B tier factions have a Stable Growth Rate. They don’t conquer too fast or slow, it’s just right for the average player. The Baby Bear of the tiers.
I was one of those people who thought Malakai's early game was hella hard, til Legend pointed out how well the Stalk armor interacts with Gyrocopter stacks. Now I just capture the province with the starting army while the gyro building is constructing. Between the one you start with, normal, and adventure recruitment, you can have 13 units worth by turn 6, and easily steamroll through the region.
Please DO updated tier lists for units. I'd watch em all
I hope you continue to be sponsored and can keep doing tierlist videos - they're probably my favorite piece of content!
If people bored or has problems with some factions because of their start positions and surrounding enemies they can try randomized start positions mod. It can bring a totally new expirience of the campaing. Starting Boris in Naggaroth or Demon prince in Cathay is very refreshing.
Kahlida has by far the worst starting enemies with dwarves and lizardmen yet she has nothing but her cav which is heavily countered by both of them early on... Her start is hellish and if you're not fast enough Skarbrand or the skavens will add to your problems. Ah a'd you start on a minor settlement as well... Seriously just tell us not to play her it would be faster.
A shame because she's a really cool design.
Costin’s going to cry when he sees where you placed Khorne. 😂
I have a Rapanse campaign going and I use infantry from outposts to round out my armies. It would be nice to see Bretonnia get an update so they have some viable late game units besides cavalry, paladins, and footsquires.
Hard disagree on Kugath, post rework he is an absolute beast and easily better than any chaos warrior faction. Thanks to his increased chance for blessed symptoms youre almost always gonna have access to boosted income/reduced upkeep plagues so your economy is going to be absolutely ridiculous, meaning youll always have the cash to instantly spit out full health stacks if anything should approach. Nurgles tech tree after the rework is very good, with solid, useful boosts to all units. His nurgling buffs being global means you can easily drown people in cheap trash stacks that can punch above their weight. In the late game, you are instantly recruiting full stacks of rank 7+ units, for free or almost free depending on your infrastructure with very little need to build up a recruitment base, how does that make for a weak faction? Highly recommend giving him another shot, hes definitely one of the most OP factions I've played once the ball gets rolling, which it does fairly early.
I don’t understand, how can we kill isabella and vlad then revive them and get them as a hero?? Is there revive mechanic that i dont know?
Thr changeling its a pretty good starting faction bc you can get used to a combination of range/melee units, beasts and diplomacy and doest matter what you do even if u fked up you never lose, good faction to learn about WH mechanics
I played as Khatep (Exiles of Nehek) and just ran around with 8 liche priests, 2 Caskets of Souls, 2 Screaming Skull Catapaults, and the rest Great Bows and Sepulcher Stalkers. Nothing could touch me. 0 casualties every battle. His liche priests get crazy boosts.
Could you make an updated tier list for most fun factions to play with?
Take a shot every time Legend says "projecting power"
"(@33:56 With Slaanesh) You have to stay on edge for the entirety of your campaign."
gonna argue about Kairos, recently completed a long campaign with him and once you get force peace and his skill which reduces changing of the ways cooldowns by 3 turns pretty much no one can touch you if you don't want them to, was fighting across Lustria with clan pestilens as my vassal while fighting Kroq gar and keeping tiq taq to, Thorek and Settra at bay with force peace for fewer grimoires than I was making in a turn, already miss the ability to get a faction to leave me alone playing any other faction.
Ikit claw is my favorite total war faction, love watching my gun line just mow down charging melee units before nuking them.
A race tierlist would be interesting imo
Bold of you to say in 2024
@@SamSchlimpert IN THE VIDEO GAME!
@@hardcorelace7565 Oh right! A race tierlist "in Warhammer 3." Your secret is safe with me, buddy.
@@hardcorelace7565 Too late, you said the words, I shall report you to the PC police at once. Your trial shall be made without any context.
@@MichaelDavis-mk4me NOOOOOOOOO
Fantastic as always Legend!! I think you should start adding the version update (5.1) in each title so they never feel “out of date” but rather reflecting whatever version of the game was up by the time the tier list was uploaded!
Isabella became a LL in one of my campaigns without any of my influence. How did the AI do that and how can I replicate it? It was great being able to farm regen again.
for malakai my tip if you have a difficult time is to take advantage of that he is a horde and relocate I sack my way to silver pinnacle and finish that legendary grudge since you get cash from fighting and a ton of XP I do abuse the auto resolve and ambush stance it might not work if you manually fight every battle.
I can't imagine how anyone could consider a faction that can literally make entire armies appear out of thin air weak.
Nice video. Keep up the good work and keep the tierlists coming :D
I know Kislev struggle with starting location (especially Boris) but I kinda of really like the lore of how they are supposed to be the main human faction constantly holding back the powers of Chaos from the north (much like Cathay). And it’s always just this constant slog to hold them all off and push em back. It just feels right.
I played 2000 hours with Nurgle before update and 200h after it, most of it with Ku’gath. After update, he can everywhere recruit units for free at lvl9! -80% maintenance costs and 60% resistens against missles for all armies in one province. Defending your own cities is super easy because of immediate recruitment at full health. From my experience he belongs to the "S"
(you need to confederate Tamurkhan for -80% maintenance costs and if you du that correctly you will get all his heros)
(confederate Epidemius to get -90% maintenance and 70% resistens for him)
Tip: Ku’gath Perfekt Plague is +30Armor +20%MissleRessitence -30%maintenance costs, switch that one Perfekt Plague between you armees to have it forever!
now here is some bullshit in a total warhammer related comment ... if i ever seen one.
What factions have the strongest air units?
I never thought Total War series made this day for having almost a hundred factions in trilogy fantasy series, more than Medieval, Empire, Shogun2, Rome2, Attila and Three Kingdoms sequels combined
I've always thought Malus is ridiculously powerful by being able to be a 1 person doomstack to get your empire started and then move to massive growth once you have some territory which for me made it one of the easiest campaigns. Really recommend the old world campaign as well with him as really fun.
good to see the beastmen are high up on this list. i remember when they were the most butts faction
Played Grom some weeks ago. Had mostly lower Goblin spear stuff with shields, and dominated south Bretonnia AND Athel Loren before Turn 20. Regeneration for the Gobbos, Shields on them, and Unbreakable for the few trolls, and DAMN those tiny Greenskins bombed through the Enemy Armies and Settlements. Okay i did most of this during my first WAAARGH, but it was worth it. But i only played on very hard not legendary.. so yeah.
the waagh is the most op thing here. Grom can have three armies very early with cheap units and with a waagh at that time, there is no amry on the map, that can mess with him. They shuld allow waag earliest at turn 20 or so, than it would be maybe another story.
I just played my second campaign ever as Nakai. He is a snowball. You get him going, he can support more insanely strong units than anyone else since your vassels give you so much money
He is S tier in my opinion. An absurdly strong melee lord with steroids for units that are already strong. Super good tech tree and the biggest total movement distance i have ever seen in this game once you have access to the temple buff.
@@Skrubus Campaign bonus movement is capped to +50%, like half the factions in the game can reach that just fine
I do not tolerate calvary slander, in the game series that got me to appreciate calvary.
Another thing that makes Norsca so strong is they have great army stances. It makes a big difference. Definitely want a Rot Blood and / or Skegi Norsca DLC.
I think I disagree with not putting nagarythe in S tier. You have high elf income, ambush attack and underway stance and high elf units. The campaign is a breeze to get a short victory for and since you eliminate the delves, they almost never land on the donut giving you ulthuan for free.
In the future, would it be possible to sort factions within tiers according to their respective power compared to the other factions in the tier? For example, I think you should have put Gelt as the first faction within A tier if you felt they were the strongest A tier faction.
Is archaon a powerful enemy? in all my campaigns i've played in the last 3 months he just has literally 1 settlement and only his starting army for the entire campaign until I eventually come over and kill him.
Please order the tierlists! I would love to see how they compare to each other.
Finally! I have been waiting for this!!!
Also I think you've completely underrated Drycha, but that's another long writeup that I don't have the energy to do right now. Just know that Drycha can essentially get free upkeep on Tree Spirits, while also drowning in gold which allows you to easily pick up Elf/Beast/Allied Faction units.
I'm also kind of shocked that you rated the Vampire Counts so highly when they fall of a damn cliff in the mid/late game. They're easily one of the least impressive armies at this point.
Anyway, sorry for expressing only my disagreements - I think you did a great job overall and I appreciate the dedication and work it took to put this list together.
Can you do an allied recruitment tier list? As in what factions benefit most from it maybe with particular units most likely to be available from factions they can ally with easier or harder
With Boris I like to retreat back to Praag then build up from there. It allows you to get a couple province under your belt before taking on Archeon. If you're lucky Katarin has been stomped making an easy confed.
Never really get why Brettonia are so underrated, like I get they are not the best but one of my favourite campaigns in the game is Repanse. She herself as a lord is an absolute beast, she provides some good buffs and outside of Taurox or Skarbrand, for me at least, has been the campaign where i've destroyed most of the rest of the world in double quick time
Ghorst is by far and wide the strongest Vampire count faction, if not one of the top 3 faction in the entire game. His zombies are so absurdly strong that each army is basically a doom stack even when facing late game armies. You can expand so quickly, your armies cost 500-1000 gold and are virtually unkillable.
It’s pretty hard to argue that strong zombies make him top 3 when Skarbrand can conquer the entire map in 10 turns, Taurox isn’t super far behind, and the changeling can literally do whatever he wants across the map with no risk whatsoever.
Also, talsyn can get similar upkeep armies with actual elite units, cult of sotek can build for free and get infinite money, and skaven are skaven. Ghorst may be strong, but he’s nowhere near the level of those factions and his start position is pretty meh.
@@Loj84 Have you played Caravan of the Blue Roses? They can spam a near unlimited number of nigh unkillable doom stacks starting at turn 10. Their armies don't take recruitment time, nearly no upkeep and are fully capable of taking on 3-4 end game armies. Skarbrand and Taurox take a very specific strategy to pull off their early turn full map conquests. A nearly brain dead player with a zombie army can 1v1 ANY thing the computer can throw at them. I'm not discounting either of those faction, Ghrost faction just ranks among them and certain above the other Vampire counts.
Talsyn and Sotek require recruitment time and their armies aren't generally going to be nearly as strong as a single zombie stack, but for every 1 army either of those factions can make Ghorst is putting out 5-6 stronger armies.
Skaven are skaven, but their armies require upkeep, recruitment time and some planning and strategy to use.
Caravan of the blue Rose doesn't have that bad of a starting location. Cathay and the Dark Lands are easily expanded into. Nothing the AI can build in the first 100 turns can kill a stack of zombies, literally every battle is a win.
@@Bob-cb3tv Skarbrand could make Ghorst a ghost so fast its not even funny
Just gonna throw out a comment here to help with the almighty algorithm. Appreciate ya Legend and good luck as a dad!
I would actually put Aranessa Saltspite one tier higher. While it is true that the units she boosts specifically are only useful in the early game, she herself has a decent skill tree and is a welcome change from the actual undead lords. Furthermore, her special trait gives her extra cash for every sea location, even the ones that don't give you a battle will give you 7500 gold extra, all the time, everywhere. The start location doesn't really matter for Vampire Coast factions anyway, but her start is close to Ikit Claw which means you can get the defeat trait very early on. The dwarfs and the greenskins are constantly at war with each other, giving you some potential room to breath and/or get on good terms with the dwarfs for a while and if Khemri wins in the desert to the South you can make them your allies pretty easily as well. And then it is all smooth sailing from there, if you catch my drift.
So i just wanted to add something to this tier list. I think Tyrion is definitely S tier. I realize he doesn't have magic. But my god he's so goddamn powerful in mele. The wizard he starts with is pretty good too. Heavens is highly under-rated. The thing about Tyrion is that the Phoenix is an incredible starting unit to get. The Silver Helms w/ Shields are also VERY under-rated. But most of all, his economy is BONKERS! 50% off on upkeep for virtually every unit you would ever put in your starting army. And he can basically out duel anyone. Find a smart balance between your spell line and getting plus magic item drop chance with your wizard. Tyrion is S tier.
There is NO DOUBT that they made the game harder with patch 5.2. It's MUCH harder. I have actually struggled with certain campaigns since this past update. But not Tyrion. Playing as Tyrion is a joke! Its quite fun actually.
I would put Malakai into S-tier, because his adventure rewards are ridiculously OP, just four canons alone can decimate most armies, but i found that while malakai is unbeatable, its kinda hard to hold territory with other armies, its quite space up there on map and you have enemies on three fronts basically, so while malakai is on his trip having fun, the rest of his territory is in pain. I agree with rest.