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Wow. Awesome review.

Between Rome 2 and warhammer, these games are going to consume my life...

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Indeed! I plan on playing Warhammer for a loooonnnnngggg time to come. I don't think you'll be disappointed.

Ditto above. First game I've played in the Total War series. So far it's really good with a lot of replay potential. If you're a fan of the old Warhammer lore, this game nails it and leaves a lot of room for future expansion. Multiplayer is meh. Not sure if that's typical of a Total War game but I find most games to be pretty one-sided and stale. There are some blatant balancing issues, but hopefully that will be cleaned up soon(ish). Overall - well worth the purchase.

Anyone know any helpful/funny/skilled total youtubers?

I know POM is really good at multiplayer.

Legendoftotalwar is hilarious. The guy takes the game so seriously and his battles are him freaking out the whole time.

What faction do you recommend starting as?

The dwarves not having Cavalry is a huge turnoff and the vampires sound very weak.

I want to play as the chaos faction, but I heard you can't capture settlements with them?

The Dwarves are pretty easy to start as honestly.

The Quarellers (cross bow units) are incredibly strong throughout the entire game. Just make sure you don't overextend into the South against the Orcs too soon before consolidating your gains.

The Waaaagh armies can be brutal.

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What faction do you recommend starting as?

The dwarves not having Cavalry is a huge turnoff and the vampires sound very weak.

I want to play as the chaos faction, but I heard you can't capture settlements with them?

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I ended up picking this up and played a normal dwarf campaign for my first playthrough, which was a good way to get acquainted, but got a bit boring and repetitive after a while.

I'm early into my second playthrough as vampires now on hard and already thinking I'll be abusing raise dead to get a pretty baller army ahead of my competition. VC seems to be a race that can quickly summon massive armies, but is slowed in its conquests by how quickly it can spread vampiric corruption. It's a neat dynamic after the traditional dwarven economy. We'll see how this goes.

I started as the dwarves and it got boring quick.

Switched over to the Vampire counts this weekend, and it was addicting. I like their starting location and their units are awesome!

I've been leveling up manfred and pretty much can take out half a stack with him and my varghulf.

I'm on turn 80 right now and I got a notification about the chaos doomstacks heading south. Moving all my forces back to sylvania to defend the homeland

I built one of those corruption furnaces in all of my main castles within each province.

The corruption seemed to spread faster that way

So I picked this game up this weekend and started playing it. I find that I royally suck at managing my forces during a battle unless I put it in the super-slow-motion speed. I mean literally the enemy AI mounted units run circles around me if I don't. Do you'll play or autoresolve most of your battles that are somewhat even (or outmatched)?

Also, I've got a couple enemy heroes attacking some of my villages. I can't seem to figure out how to get rid of them. I can't seem to attack them with an army or anything. What am I missing?

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What faction do you recommend starting as?

The dwarves not having Cavalry is a huge turnoff and the vampires sound very weak.

I want to play as the chaos faction, but I heard you can't capture settlements with them?

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*Disclaimer* - Long post here. I've only played the Empire and a little bit of the Dwarfs. If anything below is incorrect, then please feel free to correct me or disagree with me. A lot of this is just my opinion based on what I've read and observed in game so far. Would be interested to hear other's opinions and thoughts as well. Thanks!

I'm very partial to the Empire due to the fact that they are, IMO, the most balanced of the 5 factions and plus I just like the humans. Not to mention that their starting location allows for some growth and breathing room before you are forced to face down Greenskins in the south, Vampire Counts in the east, or Chaos in the north. Typically the Dwarfs and Empire are allies so they rarely are an issue but you can't neglect diplomatic relations with them for sure. That's the Empire's challenge is that they are surrounded by enemies but with careful mgmt (diplomacy and force) can avoid multi-front wars, at least until they are powerful enough to handle a two front war say between Chaos, VC, and/or Greenskins. If you are finding yourself in a 3 front war between the 3 other factions then you are definitely doing something wrong and in for a rough go of it. From a unit perspective, most of the Empire units are middle of the pack. Solid Infantry, solid missile troops, strong Heavy Cavalry, excellent artillery, and solid Magic. Still, the Empire has no flying units outside of mounts you can upgrade for your Hero's/Lords. So they are a good/strong faction to play no doubt as they have a good mix of units that offer great flexibility tactically. Their weakness to me is that they are surrounded by foes AND other factions separately have better units. For example, the Dwarfen, Greenskin and Chaos infantry is, generally, better than the Empire's. VC, Chaos, Greenskins have better Large/Monster units than the Empire though the Steam Tank is quite good for the Empire. Chaos and VC cavalry is, generally, better than the Empire's. You get the idea. They rarely have the best of anything but when all their units are working together on the battlefield, supporting each other, using the land well (Hills, forests, bodies of water, secured flanks, etc.), playing to the enemy's weaknesses, they are a formidable foe in Attack and Defense. They are the essence of balance when it comes down to it and I found them very challenging, yet enjoyable and satisfying to play.

One of this game's strengths is that each faction is so uniquely different from a play style perspective. Playing as the Empire is very different than playing as the Dwarfs. Yes, the Dwarfs have no cavalry but that is true to the lore. I mean, who's ever seen a Dwarf ride a horse? So no cavalry for them but they make up for it with superb Infantry, strong missile troops, and excellent artillery. A well put together Dwarven army is a defensive juggernaut and one hell of a tough nut to crack. They aren't meant to be fast, offensive type units and armies but they are really tough in defense and inexorable in the advance with the right unit support and use of the land (Hills, forests, bodies of water, secured flanks, etc.). I think they particularly excel in defensive Mountain battles. The last thing I want to do is go into a Dwarf's backyard and try to pick a fight. It's also true that the Dwarfs have no magic (i.e, Wizards with offensive spells) but they do have Runes that they can use to buff/debuff and augment their abilities. They are a Defensive player's dream faction to play.

I haven't played as the VC but what I know is that they don't have any missile troops or if they do, they are poor and they have the need to have Vampiric Corruption in any province they move through or control otherwise they take damage every turn. Again, this makes sense from a lore angle. Vamps can't just saunter around in the daylight unmolested for obvious reasons. They need the darkness and corruption before they can openly show themselves. Plus side of Vampiric Corruption is that it hurts your enemies. Their armies are very intriguing to me. No/poor missile troops but they have awesome Monster/Flying units. (Varghulf, Terrorgheists, Crypt ghouls). They have mostly weak infantry(zombies,skeletons, etc.) but their elite infantry they do have is excellent (Grave Guards). They have superb Heavy cavalry in their Hexwraiths. They also have Magic and their necromantic abilities look to be quite useful. They can raise the dead. That's pretty cool and useful on the battlefield. I would say they are different take on a balanced faction. Similar to the Empire but with different pros/cons.

I haven't played them but the Greenskins are almost an exact opposite of the Dwarves IMO. They are an Offensive Player's dream. They are aggressive and meant to Attack, Attack, Attack!! Their Infantry is excellent (arguably best in the game outside of Chaos), solid missile troops, solid Heavy Cavalry, excellent Large/Monster units (Giants, Trolls, Spiders, etc.) and they have pretty solid Magic to my knowledge as well. Their weaknesses are artillery (compared to the Dwarfs and Empire) and they suffer in the Leadership category. Their units are far more prone to rout than other Faction's units when they face a formidable foe. Also, since they are all about the Offensive and Attacking, they have a Fightiness meter that if it drops too low by not fighting their enemies (everyone that's not a Greenskin), they will start fighting amongst themselves and their units will disband/rebel. It can be a weakness but also a strength as if your Fightiness meter is high(i.e, you've won lots of battles recently), you have a chance to obtain a "WAAAGH!!", which is essentially a whole other 20 stack army that shows up to fight with you. It's very lore accurate and a cool feature for them. Their other weakness is economically they struggle to develop their provinces so troop replenishment can be a concern. Most people would say they are the hardest faction to play from a Campaign perspective but in battle they are right up there with Chaos as tough foes.

Lastly, there's Chaos. These guys have probably the best Heavy Infantry in the game. They have well armed and armoured Infantry and Heavy Cavalry, excellent Large/Monster units, and solid Artillery. Their weaknesses are that they have poor missile units, they can't trade with other factions, and they are poor at diplomacy. Still, they are some tough SOBs to go up against in battle. They are similar to the Greenskins in that they are very much an Offensive styled faction. To my knowledge, you can capture settlements with them (I will stand corrected if someone else knows this) but they favor more raiding and razing tactics for funds not to mention they really rely on the spread of Chaos corruption to lower public order and spread rebellion in enemy provinces to weaken them before they attack. They definitely favor someone who likes an aggressive style of play but that's not as hard as the Greenskins from what I can tell and from what I've read.

For the TLDR crowd, take a look at this article on the 5 different factions.

http://www.gamerevolution.com/features/a-guide-to-choosing-which-faction-to-play-in-total-war-warhammer

I just besieged a heavily fortified Nuln (capital city) defended by a strong 20 stack human army with one legit Mannfred army and two 20 stacks of zombies led by vampire lords. I only built two siege towers before attacking. It was an epic battle. Zombies crawling up every wall on ladders to swarm the humans on the ramparts. The defenders ran out of ammunition and still my undead were advancing. In the end, I had probably just a couple hundreds assorted skeletons and zombies left and my three vampire generals, who killed the nearly shattered remnants of the human army on their own to seal the win.

There's now a 10,000 casualty graveyard I can raise dead from at Nuln for whenever I advance on the empire, but the chaos invasion started the same turn so I'll focus on putting down rebellions and repelling chaos for a while.

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So I picked this game up this weekend and started playing it. I find that I royally suck at managing my forces during a battle unless I put it in the super-slow-motion speed. I mean literally the enemy AI mounted units run circles around me if I don't. Do you'll play or autoresolve most of your battles that are somewhat even (or outmatched)?

Also, I've got a couple enemy heroes attacking some of my villages. I can't seem to figure out how to get rid of them. I can't seem to attack them with an army or anything. What am I missing?

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Managing your units during a battle can be challenging. If the battle is even or i'm outmatched, then yes, I for sure do not auto-resolve. I only auto-resolve when I overwhelmingly have the advantage. I mean what's the point right? I typically favor the pause button quite frequently so I can stop and think and then act though I also will let it just go at full speed or in slow mo if I want more of a challenge.

For your second issue, you have to develop and maintain your own core set of heroes that can counter act and attack the enemy's heroes.

I've noticed playing as the vampires, that diplomacy in this game is unforgiving.

For example, If I attack someone soon after a peace treaty, the dwarves immediately attack and RAZE my castles.

It's like they're just waiting for me to screw up and give them a reason to attack.

I can't STAND those annoying little ****heads.

You can play the game however you want.

I also fight the majority of my battles, unless the odds are overwhelmingly in my favor.

There's just something so satisfying about having huge large scale battles and trying to maintain order throughout the chaos.

I usually split my army into 3 parts, surrounding the AI and flanking/trapping them inside. It's too much for it to handle or keep up with.

This method has usually worked for me in previous total wars.

It's love watching the vargheists and terrorgheist land on the walls and just wreck havoc on those poor humans.

The animations are great.

First time I've ever thought a Blood and Gore paid DLC was worth it.

Seeing an explosion of blood and libs fly out of your blobs of infantry as artillery plows them is awesome.

I'm loving this game. VC all the ways. Mannfred is SCARY strong. IMO he is the strongest Lord in the entire game. I soloed three chaos full stacks with with one stack with Mannfred. The Khorne Champion, the Tzeentch Champion AND Archaeon.

The most epic battle I have ever played. Only thing that saved me was my 3 terrorgheists and Mannfreds heal ability. And I ended up losing all the TGs. So worth it just for the win.

I was thinking about buying the blood and gore dlc. everyone seems to like it so far.

How is your manfred army set up? I love playing as the VC, but I've been unsuccessful against the chaos hordes so far.

I have the same varghulf, 1 terrorgheist, 2 vargheists, and a bunch of grave guard and dark Knights. So far I've been struggling with this set up.

If you like actually watching the battles unfold and just dont auto resolve it's pretty neat. It was only three bucks so I picked it up.

And I went the infantry and beast route. Pretty much skipped the cavalry route. So early game I focused on my skeleton armies and abilities. To include skill points for buffing skeletons. And bats. I skipped the dire wolves. I don't know what it is but I LOVE the Fell Bats. Once you put some research and skill points into them they are a legitimate threat almost to the end of the game. So my skeletons and bats carried me until mid game when I picked up grave guard. swapped out my skeletons for a even mix of regular and great weapons grave guard. Used that combo until late game (around turn 80 for me) when I picked up the last tier for the beast line. I had been saving my money and ensuring I was accruing over 5K net of currency every turn. When I finally unlocked them I immediately picked up three terrorgheists and two more varghulfs. I then swapped out half of my bats for vargheists.

So now my army composition is at late game and can solo any end game Chaos horde and two with planning and three at once if you are extremely careful.

I've got 4 each of the grave guards, three terrorgheists, three vargulfs, three vargheists, a couple bats and a banshee.

My tactics so far in battle has been to lock the enemy down with my grave guards and then use my flying units to hit them in the rear/ solo range units and then use my varghulfs to concentrate on particularly hard units like chaos trolls. I then use Mannfred as a spell caster initially to DOT the enemy commander to death (it's almost unfair really) and then use a mix of hexes to debuff the enemy leadership and just straight melee. Mannfred can solo entire units by himself.

So far this tactic has been horrifyingly effective. I just surround and break their spirit and hunt them down afterwards.

I love it.

I think why you might be struggling is you are using an even mix of infantry, beasts, and cav. I have learned that it is best to concentrate on two of the three. All the resources and research I would have spent on cav have gone into my others making them into great units instead of good units. Just my advice.

And with my playstyle I was more suited towards infantry and beasts. I keep my infantry together so they dont get surrounded and can support each other if need be. Then use my beasts to carry the battle for me. I ve got nearly all the reserach possible on the skeleton and beast technology trees and have quite a few points in Mannfred pumping up their stats as well.

I've always loved using cav, Mostly for mobility in other total war games. I wanted to start a new VC campaign using the new blood Knights, but I'll try a beast army build.

I am sure you could make a badass cav based army. You would just have to focus on that route from the beginning. This is actually my second VC playthrough. Got my ass handed to me by a WAAAAAAGHHH the first time. I also learned that I didn't really like the black knights. I found them to be particularly squishy for my tastes. And with the advent of flying units I figured that would by my mobility factor.

Next time ill do a cav based one and see how it turns out. I am still around turn 120 right now and rolling in cash so ill make an army of cav and play around with that. The dwarves have been eyeing my **** for a while now while I was playing hookie with the chaos invasion. My original plan was to make a couple of stack of pure zombies and see how far I can get into their lands. (they are stacked up with 28 settlements now) just for fun. I think ill send some cav to support them now. Either way it'll be fun to see!

I just repelled chaos in my hard VC campaign the other day. Empire declared war on me just as Archaeon showed up, so I killed the empire then about-faced east and used raise dead to build three anti chaos armies. My composition was 6 spears, a couple grave guard, then a mix of vargulf, terror gheist, hex wraiths, crypt horrors and vargheists. I used ambush stance to hide my armies and lure chaos' three stacks into my lands, then I sent all three armies + lightning strike to eradicate each chaos army one at a time. I outnumbers chaos so thoroughly I was able to hit them from three sides in every battle and then send in delayed hex wraith charges to hit them in the rear. In one turn I eradicated the chaos invasion's three mightiest stacks at negligible losses to myself.

All I have to do now is settle the vast, desolate north to secure the win and make sure brettonia and a strong Tilia don't get any ideas in the west or south.

Next playthrough will be my first attempt at Empire of Greenskin, I haven't decided which yet.

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I am sure you could make a badass cav based army. You would just have to focus on that route from the beginning. This is actually my second VC playthrough. Got my ass handed to me by a WAAAAAAGHHH the first time. I also learned that I didn't really like the black knights. I found them to be particularly squishy for my tastes. And with the advent of flying units I figured that would by my mobility factor.

Next time ill do a cav based one and see how it turns out. I am still around turn 120 right now and rolling in cash so ill make an army of cav and play around with that. The dwarves have been eyeing my **** for a while now while I was playing hookie with the chaos invasion. My original plan was to make a couple of stack of pure zombies and see how far I can get into their lands. (they are stacked up with 28 settlements now) just for fun. I think ill send some cav to support them now. Either way it'll be fun to see!

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This is also my second VC play. I stuck with the beast build, and you were right. The flying units mobility makes up for cav, and they're fun to use.

Luckily I haven't had to deal with the orcs. The dwarves have kept them occupied, but they somehow still find time to harass me. It takes too much time to finish off their settlements and the attrition I take makes it near impossible. Just not worth it.

Maybe I'll just stick to playing normal since it's more casual. Hard mode and up is just too frustrating.

Bretonnia's official today b1tches!!! whoohooo! Been waiting for this for some time now.

Bretonnia

Looks like they botched the early release for this but no matter, it's out now.