Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Lots of runes that Runesmiths can cast (and even overcharge) during battles for various effects.

Doesn't use Winds of Magic, but has individual and global cool-downs, so a particular Rune may have a cool down, and there's an overall cool down before you can use any others that aren't on cool down as well.

Excellent. Having Thorek without actual casting of runic magic would have just been wrong! Bring on the Rune of Doom!

I mean if it is Thorek cool. I mostly thought they would leave him for Warhammer 3 and whatever the Mortal Empire campaign for that will be. Sorta like how we haven't had a Grand Master Legendary Lord yet for the Empire. Been waiting for The Rieksmarshal to show up.

Between the Beastmen, Lizardmen and Dwarfs it seems like a decently large update.

Ogres look good and like all the mechanic changes




Images

 Commodus Leitdorf wrote:
I mean if it is Thorek cool. I mostly thought they would leave him for Warhammer 3 and whatever the Mortal Empire campaign for that will be.

The timing of this Dwarf update is likely due to the impending release of TWWH3. The immortal empires map expansion will start right on the edge of Dwarves territory. And it's likely that there will be Dwarves settlements scattered around the map in the mountain ranges in TWWH3. Pushing the Dwarf update now allows them to get the bugs worked out, and test the mechanics properly before the third game arrives.

Makes sense and I'm cool with it coming early honestly. I was planning on playing a Dwarf campaign for my next go through anyway once I finish this Rakarth one I'm on.

 Commodus Leitdorf wrote:
Makes sense and I'm cool with it coming early honestly. I was planning on playing a Dwarf campaign for my next go through anyway once I finish this Rakarth one I'm on.

Just finished a Belegar ME one - quite good fun.

I remember when I said Dwarves would probably get a rework before TW3 and got laughed at.

Ahhh, such good times.

Very excited by the new updates. Now I don't know who to play first. I think I definitely want the lizard dwarves though

I'm going to be a bit of a wet blanket and say I don't really like the idea of Ogre Mercs.

Working within the strengths and weaknesses of an army is half the point of Warhammer where the different factions are so diverse. Having Mercs that can be taken by any faction to patch weaknesses, meh, I'd rather they just saved them up and released them as their own faction.

One good thing though, the auto resolve is now no longer a guess. It actually tells you what the outcome will be. I'll admit, I used to quicksave before an autoresolve then reload it to fight manually if the outcome sucked, now it'll just tell you whether or not you the broad outcome of an autoresolve.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
I'm going to be a bit of a wet blanket and say I don't really like the idea of Ogre Mercs.

Working within the strengths and weaknesses of an army is half the point of Warhammer where the different factions are so diverse. Having Mercs that can be taken by any faction to patch weaknesses, meh, I'd rather they just saved them up and released them as their own faction.

One good thing though, the auto resolve is now no longer a guess. It actually tells you what the outcome will be. I'll admit, I used to quicksave before an autoresolve then reload it to fight manually if the outcome sucked, now it'll just tell you whether or not you the broad outcome of an autoresolve.

It even tells you what units you will loose!

But it's still kinda silly in the way it kills things.

"Your 15 chaff archer units will be totally fine. Your unique monster that you started with and can't recruit for at least another 30 turns? Oh that's dead!"

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
But it's still kinda silly in the way it kills things.

"Your 15 chaff archer units will be totally fine. Your unique monster that you started with and can't recruit for at least another 30 turns? Oh that's dead!"

Well now you have the choice - auto and loose it - fight and try not to!

Thork's model is a bit... odd. Not surprised they went with shieldbearers again, but the red lights on the front of his anvil look like a terrible computer console from a bad 80s sci-fi film.

Interestingly, he doesn't actually start on it, though.
His banner/symbol is really nice.

As far as the 'dwarf rework' goes... they've added more stuff to the Forge. And a high number of grudges can spawn slayer units that you can recruit from the RoR pool rather than needing buildings (though you can also do that).

The new Forge bit is runes, all dwarf characters can equip 3 and they effectively replace the caster item slot. Thorek also has his own stuff that he can 'reforge' for his quest.
Runesmith runes are now more like magic (though a cooldown, rather than winds of magic)

For the sake of disambiguation, Runes really need explaining.
Runesmiths have castable Runes.
There are still unit-equipable Runes that function like banners
And now there are character-equipable Runes that add stat bonuses. Unlike tabletop where they're alternatives to magic weapons, armor, etc, these are in addition, which makes dwarf characters even nastier.

Post battle option for dwarfs is now 'drink to victory' which gives a province buff (growth/order/income).

Let's play: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNzzuRK0Nak

Legend of Total War posted a video using an Ogre "doomstack", gives some indication of how they might play. I guess the conclusion is they are okay but not exceptional, but we'll see down the track when the actual OK faction is released what they have.

Well, the big thing is the faction will actually have skills and buffs. Tagging along in armies that don't support them is unsurprisingly not great.

I agree with HBMC, the big thing is the basic animation rig and models are done.

Voss wrote:
Thork's model is a bit... odd. Not surprised they went with shieldbearers again, but the red lights on the front of his anvil look like a terrible computer console from a bad 80s sci-fi film.

Interestingly, he doesn't actually start on it, though.
.

Most legendary Lords have to get their signature artefacts during their campaign - eg Vlad has to get his ring and sword back etc.

 Mr Morden wrote:

Voss wrote:
Thork's model is a bit... odd. Not surprised they went with shieldbearers again, but the red lights on the front of his anvil look like a terrible computer console from a bad 80s sci-fi film.

Interestingly, he doesn't actually start on it, though.
.

Most legendary Lords have to get their signature artefacts during their campaign - eg Vlad has to get his ring and sword back etc.

Well, he has to go get his hammer (oddly a lot of the FLC recently either start with an artifact or get it for free pretty quickly- ie, fewer or no quest battles). Is just the other dwarf LL with carriers starts with them. There isn't a foot option.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
Legend of Total War posted a video using an Ogre "doomstack", gives some indication of how they might play. I guess the conclusion is they are okay but not exceptional, but we'll see down the track when the actual OK faction is released what they have.

No units, outside of some ranged or artillery, get busted without appropriate unique, red line, blue line, or LL faction effect buffs.

 trexmeyer wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
Legend of Total War posted a video using an Ogre "doomstack", gives some indication of how they might play. I guess the conclusion is they are okay but not exceptional, but we'll see down the track when the actual OK faction is released what they have.

No units, outside of some ranged or artillery, get busted without appropriate unique, red line, blue line, or LL faction effect buffs.

Some doomstacks don't really rely on Lord buffs to work well, especially ones that revolve around monsters. The Stegadon doomstack for example is pretty capable all on its lonesome, adding a life Slann for healing is good but even without it, it's a very competent doomstack.

So I was mildly concerned the Ogres would be a bit OTT for a merc unit in some factions, but yeah, I kinda forgot that in general in TWW2 the Monstrous Infantry tend to be a bit underwhelming.

If you are playing with Doomstacks than balance is not really of Interest I would not think?

I don't really play doomstacks***, but some doomstacks offer insight into balance (whilst of course others are just aberrations brought about by stacking certain units with certain buffs).


***Except when I'm playing Wood Elves because late game there isn't a lot of options to make a balanced army that won't just get wiped out.


Though there is some debate on the definition of "doomstack", I think it's just maxing out your armies in the best way, that might be monster spam in one army, buff stacking in another army, but in another army (like Dwarfs) it might still be a "balanced" army that just makes use of the best units.

Doomstacks existing in the first place is a sign of either a shortcoming of faction design or game mechanics design.

There seems to be soom debate about them and what exactly makes a Doom stack - hwoever people also seem to have a lot of fun making up stacks of say 19 mammoths and seeing what they can do - which is cool.

Nearest I have come is completing the Imrik campaign and after getting fighting to get all his Dragons, uniting them in one army for the final Vortex battle - otherwise I tend to restrict myself in armies - but only because I sort of roleplay it in campaign

The only thing I don't really get the is idea of setting the game to the hardest setting (I play normal-normal) but then using stacks of Monsters (or whatever) to steamroller the AI? Doesn't that kinda defeat the object of the harder setting?

Except when I'm playing Wood Elves because late game there isn't a lot of options to make a balanced army that won't just get wiped out.

Only played as Drycha and really enjoyed having a wierd and wonderful array of Beasts, Malevolent Dryads and Trees but no Elves (well apart from the mindcontrolled waystalker I had at the beginning) - although i think I had one ghost unit in the final battle.

I mean Doomstacks exist in a space no different then Power gaming lists on the tabletop. In the case of Legend he exclusively plays on Legendary difficulty. The A.I. cheats on legendary so in order to win you gotta cheat right back. I wouldn't call it broken when CA's idea of game balance is "lets have the AI cheat" instead of making a smarter AI.

 Commodus Leitdorf wrote:
I mean Doomstacks exist in a space no different then Power gaming lists on the tabletop. In the case of Legend he exclusively plays on Legendary difficulty. The A.I. cheats on legendary so in order to win you gotta cheat right back. I wouldn't call it broken when CA's idea of game balance is "lets have the AI cheat" instead of making a smarter AI.

So why play on Legendary? Is it for the achievements? Or is it fun - genually interested?

 Mr Morden wrote:

 Commodus Leitdorf wrote:
I mean Doomstacks exist in a space no different then Power gaming lists on the tabletop. In the case of Legend he exclusively plays on Legendary difficulty. The A.I. cheats on legendary so in order to win you gotta cheat right back. I wouldn't call it broken when CA's idea of game balance is "lets have the AI cheat" instead of making a smarter AI.

So why play on Legendary? Is it for the achievements? Or is it fun - genually interested?

Because its the highest challange.

The problem however is, that Total war has not inovated beyond statification of units, making legendary AI really problematic since you will lose with equivalent units against other units in melee f.e.
Hence why you see a Ranged type of meta.

Not Online!!! wrote:

 Mr Morden wrote:

 Commodus Leitdorf wrote:
I mean Doomstacks exist in a space no different then Power gaming lists on the tabletop. In the case of Legend he exclusively plays on Legendary difficulty. The A.I. cheats on legendary so in order to win you gotta cheat right back. I wouldn't call it broken when CA's idea of game balance is "lets have the AI cheat" instead of making a smarter AI.

So why play on Legendary? Is it for the achievements? Or is it fun - genually interested?

Because its the highest challange.

The problem however is, that Total war has not inovated beyond statification of units, making legendary AI really problematic since you will lose with equivalent units against other units in melee f.e.
Hence why you see a Ranged type of meta.

Is it a challenge if you can then Doomstack it? I tried the game on higher settings and found the AI "cheats" too much - so I don't play on them.

 Commodus Leitdorf wrote:
I mean Doomstacks exist in a space no different then Power gaming lists on the tabletop. In the case of Legend he exclusively plays on Legendary difficulty. The A.I. cheats on legendary so in order to win you gotta cheat right back. I wouldn't call it broken when CA's idea of game balance is "lets have the AI cheat" instead of making a smarter AI.

Yep. That trivial task of 'a smarter AI.'

I can't think of many (any?) strategy games that manage 'smarter AI' rather than passive battle buffs or resource buffs.
Some barely manage AI at all (Civ has become the flagship of that, where modders are routinely required to tighten up AI priorities to the point that they'll actually build certain unit types and act aggressively).

 Commodus Leitdorf wrote:
I mean Doomstacks exist in a space no different then Power gaming lists on the tabletop.

There's similarities, but also TWW2 lets you do baically whatever you want. Other than a few exceptions you can spam stuff (exceptions are things like Dread Saurians being linked to a building, largely limiting how many you're able to take).

The tabletop version of WHFB had points % limits on different types of units, and many units were 0-1 or similar to limit doomstacking.

Also the fact TWW2 doesn't have points limits, so once you have a stable economy you can take the 20 most powerful units rather than the 20 most logical / balanced / etc units.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also, Troglodon teaser is up...