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[Noaloha]

This morning's Three Moves Ahead podcast on Total Warhammer.
https://www.idlethumbs.net/3ma/episodes/total-war-warhammer

May 25, 2016
Good news, Games Workshop fans: your long wait is over. After literally days without a single new Warhammer or Warhammer 40K video game being launched, Total War: WARHAMMER is upon us. Fraser Brown and Dan Griliopoulos join Rob to talk about the latest entry in the Total War series that takes the series to the mildly ahistorical setting of Warhammer. The reviews have been positive and the verdict is a solid recommendation from our panel as Total Warhammer puts the fun back into Total War.

Haven't listened to it yet, but I'm keen to hear Rob's ongoing thoughts on the game after his mostly-positive-with-certain-reservations RPS review:

But only up to a point. What keeps me from wholly falling in love with Total Warhammer is my growing sense that it works because Creative Assembly ripped-out most of the strategic guts out of the game and left a facade in their place. For instance, one reason that the stakes for each battle are so high is because it’s nearly impossible to field more than one or two good armies in a game. The economy won’t allow it. Even deep into my games, the majority of my income came from “background income”, which is what Total Warhammer calls your baseline “money from the ether” income. In other words, the actual economy of Total War: Warhammer can’t really sustain any of what you see on the campaign map… which also means that expansion simply adds to your vulnerabilities without contributing resources to your war-chest.

Every faction is afflicted by this, it seems. If you pay attention to the diplomacy screen, you’ll note HUGE swings in the power rankings of each faction on the map. I couldn’t figure it out until I realized that I would become one of the top 3 powers in the game as soon as I had a couple decent standing armies (that were almost crushing me underneath their upkeep costs) and I’d plummet down to 15th or 20th as soon as I suffered major casualties. Small wonder that nothing is ever gained or lost in the Old World: no territory can fund the forces needed to protect it, so each expansion is a brief boom before an inevitable collapse. Like an annoying racing game, Total Warhammer’s campaign is rubber-banded so that building a lead is nearly impossible.

 

[Aztechnology]

Can it be that conquering as fast as possible isn't the best idea? In my (still limited) experience the faster you capture territories in the early game the more aggressive your opponents seem to get. For example on my hard empire test run I captured reikland in 6-7 turns (or so) and instantly orks entered my territory, the dwarves declared war on me and marienburg began to besiege my cities. I wasn't able to hold.
It feels like they want you to use slower tactics like diplomacy for the empire/dwarves campaign to get new territories and to build up a reasonable tech level before relaying on pure military strength. But maybe I'm just bad... don't know.

I have no idea, I just don't understand how in Total war without fail, the enemy never seems to have upkeep cost. Does a Waaargh just make all their units free? I mean there's no way they can sustain the numbers they have in conventional ways. I mean these are expensive units he has, I just lost 1500 men and he only lost the same amount even with good tactics. All his units were also rank 5 or 6. (mine 2-3) The enemy just doesn't seem to play by the same rules. Maybe I should just set it to normal or easy and it might be fair.

For example, the Waagh just started a few turns ago and look at their forces already.

The only reason Stonemine Tower has low units is because I killed most of them. Each of their heroes has multiple purple items and is 10+ are Greenskins just completely broken?

 

[Houndi101]

Welp, apparently the quests don't work with the Legendary Lords unique starting positions mod. This is gonna be a problem.

 

[ISee]

I have no idea, I just don't understand how in Total war without fail, the enemy never seems to have upkeep cost. Does a Waaargh just make all their units free? I mean there's no way they can sustain the numbers they have in conventional ways. I mean these are expensive units he has, I just lost 1500 men and he only lost the same amount even with good tactics. All his units were also rank 5 or 6. (mine 2-3) The enemy just doesn't seem to play by the same rules. Maybe I should just set it to normal or easy and it might be fair.

Yeah that's how it works. A Waaagh is free, but I'm sure the AI is still cheating.
I tried easy and it is way to easy tbh. The amount of bonuses you get during battles is insane. I was able to annihilate entire armies with just crossbow man... but at least you have a lot of time to spend looking at the graphic instead of giving orders. I think playing on normal may be a good compromise to learn the game. The overworld section is still rather unforgiving.

 

[Aztechnology]

Yeah that's how it works. A Waaagh is free, but I'm sure the AI is still cheating.
I tried easy and it is way to easy tbh. The amount of bonuses you get during battles is insane. I was able to annihilate entire armies with just crossbow man... but at least you have a lot of time to spend looking at the graphic instead of giving orders. I think playing on normal may be a good compromise to learn the game. The overworld section is still rather unforgiving.

So the Waaagh is just a plain and simple endless free 20 man army per army as long as they are fighting and winning? It's like an insane snowball force. My game is over and that's like 6 turns after that. They just came with like 5 armies and destroyed everything.

 

[Klyka]

So the Waaagh is just a plain and simple endless free 20 man army per army? Can you link me something that explains it, because I don't get this. I mean it's swallowing everything. In like 6 turns it killed multiple allies. Orcs and Goblins are known for constant infighting, so once a Waagh gets too powerful shouldn't it break off into it's own group or something?

In lore a Waaaaagh only ends if you cut off the head aka kill the Waaaghhboss, beat their biggest army and scatter them.

Orkz don't just "stop" having a Waaaaagh for "reasons".

 

[Aztechnology]

In lore a Waaaaagh only ends if you cut off the head aka kill the Waaaghhboss, beat their biggest army and scatter them.

Orkz don't just "stop" having a Waaaaagh for "reasons".

Well my campaign where I thought I was doing pretty well just ended abruptly due to the endless green tide. There's no way in hell I could fight them with all their level 6+ mounted units etc. The sheer numbers alone would have made it impossible, then mix in the level 17 lords with multiple magic items and I just shut down.

 

[ISee]

So the Waaagh is just a plain and simple endless free 20 man army per army as long as they are fighting and winning? It's like an insane snowball force. My game is over and that's like 6 turns after that. They just came with like 5 armies and destroyed everything.

Yes as klyka mentioned a waaagh is a nearly unstoppable force in the warhammer world. But it also needs time to build up.
But honestly I haven't run into one myself in this game yet so I have no idea how bad it really is.

 

[Houndi101]

I had a Waaagh with me by turn 15 in a multiplayer game

Edited the turn count

 

[Corpekata]

Probably need diplomacy to handle a waaagh, getting your allies to attack / defend.

 

[Aztechnology]

Probably need diplomacy to handle a waaagh, getting your allies to attack / defend.

I tried to coordinate with my allies, but he didn't do anything. Set a universal target etc. He just sat in his base and slowly got wiped out. I've been playing Total War since the first Rome Total War and never had this much trouble. Damn.

 

[Impulsor]

Tried the game yesterday, started campaign with Dwarfs... OMG, so much epicness.

 

[Klyka]

I tried to coordinate with my allies, but he didn't do anything. Set a universal target etc. He just sat in his base and slowly got wiped out. I've been playing Total War since the first Rome Total War and never had this much trouble. Damn.

The Old World is an unforgiving place that lore-wise is away from total annihilation pretty much every two days.

Literally the only reason the world has not ended a hundred times yet is "plot armor".

Now I am really looking forward to playing this for the first time,it seems they upped the hopelessness to 11

(It also helps that I will play Orkz)

 

[LTWheels]

I'm running it on a Core 2Duo with a 6900 series card at 1680. Auto defaults to medium/low ish in the graphics options. More than satisfied by the performance. Rome 2 was unplayable.

Quite sooth on the campaign map. A bit frame-y in battles but still playable. Not done as massive battle yet though.

Happy with it on low end specs.

 

[Camp Freddie]

Well my campaign where I thought I was doing pretty well just ended abruptly due to the endless green tide. There's no way in hell I could fight them with all their level 6+ mounted units etc. The sheer numbers alone would have made it impossible, then mix in the level 17 lords with multiple magic items and I just shut down.

I don't know about TW:W, but all previous games allowed the AI to cheat by giving
free money to all the major factions. It kinda messed up the game balance IMO, since the AI was able to literally DO ALL THE THINGS, especially if it had a small empire. The free money was a fixed amount, so it was a relatively bigger buff to smaller factions.

I remember modding MTW2 so that the hard AI cash bonus was greatly reduced. It resulted in a much better game, without constant stacks of doom.

It sounds like the AI is now getting huge XP buffs for its units too, which seems a bit unfair. I think they've always recieved buffs at higher difficulties, but it wasn't usually a huge factor. Now that heroes are a big deal, the XP/item buffs sound a bit unfair.

I'm very close to buying this, since the reviews have been very positive and no one is posting joke videos about broken AI or whatever. Sounds like 'normal' might be the way to play at first though!

 

[Aztechnology]

I don't know about TW:W, but all previous games allowed the AI to cheat by giving
free money to all the major factions. It kinda messed up the game balance IMO, since the AI was able to literally DO ALL THE THINGS, especially if it had a small empire. The free money was a fixed amount, so it was a relatively bigger buff to smaller factions.

I remember modding MTW2 so that the hard AI cash bonus was greatly reduced. It resulted in a much better game, without constant stacks of doom.

It sounds like the AI is now getting huge XP buffs for its units too, which seems a bit unfair. I think they've always recieved buffs at higher difficulties, but it wasn't usually a huge factor. Now that heroes are a big deal, the XP/item buffs sound a bit unfair.

I'm very close to buying this, since the reviews have been very positive and no one is posting joke videos about broken AI or whatever. Sounds like 'normal' might be the way to play at first though!

Yea I switched to normal. Seems a fair match in terms of units and such now. The only issue is the AI isn't as smart as the player usually so it needs a few buffs. I'm sure we'll get a great balance mod soon. I think Radious was already up.

 

[Enosh]

The Old World is an unforgiving place that lore-wise is away from total annihilation pretty much every two days.

Literally the only reason the world has not ended a hundred times yet is "plot armor

but it did end

 

[Klyka]

but it did end

We don't talk about that

 

[Gravemind IV]

Was a bit disappointed at my rig's performance with this game (so far, at least). Got an I5-6600, R9 390 and 8 gigs of RAM. If somebody has a similar setup, let me know what kind of settings you're using. I used a mix of ultra and turned some settings down, specifically shadows and whatnot.

 

[ISee]

Was a bit disappointed at my rig's performance with this game (so far, at least). Got an I5-6600, R9 390 and 8 gigs of RAM. If somebody has a similar setup, let me know what kind of settings you're using. I used a mix of ultra and turned some settings down, specifically shadows and whatnot.

We have a a performance thread which was created by a very nice person by sacrificing a lot (absolutely not exaggerated) of his free time for the neo Gaf warhammer community and it saddens him a bit because everybody is ignoring it.

Just kidding, I don't really care.

Currently dx 11 amd performance isn't really good. But before you get disappointed a dx12 patch should be available soon and performance is very promising for amd users...
If you want to just check the dx12 preview benchmark in the performance thread

 

[PeskyToaster]

I had great momentum going on chaos but some agent assassinated Archeon and it brought my machine to a screeching halt. Sucks because I have to appoint a new Lord for the army but then create a new army when Archeon gets back so I can continue his quest. I'm able to maintain three armies now. I have one of a bunch of marauders, raiding the North, my main sent of chosen and all those nasty units, and a third force building up led by Sigvald. I might send it to support my northern raiders while Archeon completes his quest. The key I found is reducing upkeep through skill points and buidlings while having a force completely dedicated to income making.

 

[Goldfishking]

Just finished my first campaign (empire on normal). Really fun and about to start another. What campaign are you guys/gals enjoying the most? Which campaign should i start next?

 

[PeskyToaster]

After an Empire playthrough I say it's time to get crazy. Vampire Counts or Chaos. Chaos would be a radically different campaign style. No settlements, horde style from Attila but Vampire Counts fight differently. They have no ranged units, powerful magic, and their units never surrender. They crumble aka take damage over time instead of fleeing.

 

[Goldfishking]

After an Empire playthrough I say it's time to get crazy. Vampire Counts or Chaos. Chaos would be a radically different campaign style. No settlements, horde style from Attila but Vampire Counts fight differently. They have no ranged units, powerful magic, and their units never surrender. They crumble aka take damage over time instead of fleeing.

Never really liked the huns in attila so not sure about chaos. Vampire counts sound cool but i've only fought in the north of the map. The south with the dwarfs and greenskins seems illusive and attractive to me.

 

[bonesmccoy]

My first campaign as the Dwarfs ended in total disaster. I expanded quuckly, just like every other TW, and then a Waagh appeared and smashed all my settlements and armies. It was fantastic.

My second try is with the Empire. I was immediately impressed by how different their units felt compared to the Dwarfs. So far I've brushed aside the Secessionists and made trade and non aggression pacts with most of my neighbours.

Just finished my first campaign (empire on normal). Really fun and about to start another. What campaign are you guys/gals enjoying the most? Which campaign should i start next?

How many turns did it take?

 

[Goldfishking]

How many turns did it take?

153

 

[Gravemind IV]

We have a a performance thread which was created by a very nice person by sacrificing a lot (absolutely not exaggerated) of his free time for the neo Gaf warhammer community and it saddens him a bit because everybody is ignoring it.

Just kidding, I don't really care.

Currently dx 11 amd performance isn't really good. But before you get disappointed a dx12 patch should be available soon and performance is very promising for amd users...
If you want to just check the dx12 preview benchmark in the performance thread

Will do. But DX12 is W10 exclusive right? Ugh, not sure if I want to upgrade to that at the moment.

 

[Megalosaro]

Kind of off topic, but are there any fid videos of war hammer tabletop being played? I've never actually seen any one play it. Usually the guys I see at game stores just stand around looking at their stuff

 

[-tetsuo-]

This is supposed to be the easiest total war? That definitely isnt true lol

 

[PeskyToaster]

This is supposed to be the easiest total war? That definitely isnt true lol

It's simpler in terms of managing your empire but I think it's a lot harder to actually survive.

 

[Sdkkds]

Kind of off topic, but are there any fid videos of war hammer tabletop being played? I've never actually seen any one play it. Usually the guys I see at game stores just stand around looking at their stuff

Take a look at guerilla miniature games channel on YouTube,

And anyone know when the blood and gore dlc is coming? I need some gore

 

[bonesmccoy]

It's simpler in terms of managing your empire but I think it's a lot harder to actually survive.

I've played far too many hours of TW since Medieval 2, and this was the first time I've lost a campaign within the 1st 20 turns.

I do wonder if that isn't the 'rubber-banding' that concerned Rob Zacny. Will the Dwarfs always get Waaagh'd if you expand that quickly?

 

[Corpekata]

Man the Waagh really is OP as shit. Playing as Greenskins, just been sending my Waagh to various settlements, unlocking them like crazy.

It's a bit weird to control mechanically, by default it follows the one it spawned from but it's a separate faction technically so it only moves after your turn, so sadly getting it involved in a massive 2 army battle is a little frustrating. End up having to like stop near an enemy army and have them initiate combat. So I've decided to mainly just send them off harrassing things and capturing settlements to boost my coffers for the moment. Probably don't want to go too crazy on it capturing places though since it takes the choice away from you in how you want to handle it + the sizeable looting / ransacking reward, but it's a good way to get a foothold early on.

 

[PeskyToaster]

I've played far too many hours of TW since Medieval 2, and this was the first time I've lost a campaign within the 1st 20 turns.

I do wonder if that isn't the 'rubber-banding' that concerned Rob Zacny. Will the Dwarfs always get Waaagh'd if you expand that quickly?

Maybe the more aggressive you are, the higher the diplomatic modifiers for being at war with you are so it's easier to bring all the orcs together. And yeah, I lost my first Chaos campaign in like ~20 turns. Very fragile in the beginning since one badly picked fight and you're army is screwed and it's difficult to recover.

 

[TheDangerMan]

Yes as klyka mentioned a waaagh is a nearly unstoppable force in the warhammer world. But it also needs time to build up.
But honestly I haven't run into one myself in this game yet so I have no idea how bad it really is.

Playing a head to head campaign on hard with a friend atm as Dwarves and the Waaagh started at turn 14. If that's the case I think I'm in trouble....

 

[Sub Zero]

Take a look at guerilla miniature games channel on YouTube,

And anyone know when the blood and gore dlc is coming? I need some gore

They usually release the blood dlcs a month after launch

 

[dan2026]

I haven't played this game but I do find it hilarious that people are terrified of being crushed by Orc Waaaaaghs.

 

[elyetis]

If I remember right it was two player on the stream I saw. Could ask about the limitation in the Twitch chat and you might get an answer.

Thanks. Seems like it's confirmed... I... really really really don't get it. I mean not only do I miss the option to play at more than 2 player in campaign... but I also really don't get why it's not there, I can't see any technical or gameplay limitation making sense.

 

[Lashley]

I recommend this channel for videos https://www.youtube.com/user/LegendofTotalWar

he has a few campaign videos up atm

 

[4Tran]

Thanks. Seems like it's confirmed... I... really really really don't get it. I mean not only do I miss the option to play at more than 2 player in campaign... but I also really don't get why it's not there, I can't see any technical or gameplay limitation making sense.

Barely anyone plays multiplayer campaign to begin with, and with turns taking up to an hour each in the late game, any more players would be really tedious.

 

[Geist-]

Phew, just completed my first campaign as the Empire on Hard, Long Campaign Victory.

A few musings:

• If you expand too fast, prepare for retaliation. I had Dwarves, Greenskins, VC, and Brettonnia attack me after blitzing a few provinces. Luckily most of them sent peace treaties after, but Greenskins were a pain in my ass for the rest of the game.
• Provinces simply can't defend themselves unless they have walls. If the enemy has a lord (which every army has to), it's going to kill your entire garrison unless he's attacking by himself. Even then, some Lords can attack by themselves and win.
• Chasing enemy armies is the most frustrating thing in this game, bar none. It's just missing the Benny Hill music.
• Steam Tanks, Steam Tanks, and more Steam Tanks.
• Even at the end I still had money problems and could only field 3 armies (elite armies, but still). Definitely a change from the end-game of previous Total War games where I had 100s of thousands of gold and 20 stacks.

 

[Google]

The restriction of gold/armies seems like a fair compromise when you look at it from the tabletop perspective.

A player rarely has more than a couple of armies at any time - so it makes sense to transfer that to this game. Army composition is more important that more armies

 

[Noaloha]

Any thoughts on whether the game allows for multiple viable early game avenues, or do the systems neccessitate figuring out a specific early goal or rush that must be reached (think newXCOM sattelite-esque) if you're to successfully transition into the mid-game?

I can't yet, sadly, find the recklessness required to spend pennies on the game (my month's disposable went on two copies of Stellaris) so apoligies if this is a null question based on actual play. I'm alarmingly following/invested-in this game vicariously because my early-90s teen-self demands it.

 

[Gaz_RB]

Is there anyway to get the minor settlements walls? Or is it just the province capital?

 

[Geist-]

Is there anyway to get the minor settlements walls? Or is it just the province capital?

Ya, tier 2 of the garrison building in minor settlements gives walls. I know Empire and the Dwarfs have it, not sure about the rest though.

 

[elyetis]

Barely anyone plays multiplayer campaign to begin with

I woud argue that this limitation can be partly at fault... as soon as I have more than 1 friend available.. playing a total war campaign is no longer a good option.

and with turns taking up to an hour each in the late game, any more players would be really tedious.

I prefer when that choice is made by the player, not the devs. If another studio had made that choice for that reason, it could have prevented me from playing great 3 or 4 player games of Heroes of Might and Magic, Civilisation or Age of wonder ( some of which I actually played in parallel while doing a 2 players coop campaign of TW Rome II ).
And since it's also a good oportunity to not be completely negative about Total War multiplayer, they did some good improvement with Rome II allowing players to make many action during the other player turn, which save quite some time.

 

[Hystzen]

When you have a Orc stack marching on your Imperial lands while your emperor is away and your only hope is the blind Lord or the ugly Lord *sigh*

 

[Furio53]

I'm a big total war fan, played tons of them for 100's of hours... While I really enjoy this game, it doesn't seem to be like the other TW games where if you want to do world domination its a long game. Seems to be much shorter... anyone else feeling this way?

 

[ShogunDarius]

i'm having issues running the game, i'm getting really low fps


The game defaulted me to high and that was too much so I changed it to medium.
Problem is in battle with a castle I get around 15 FPS. World map is fine, The opening cinematic can drop to single digits.

I'm on Windows 10
I7 3820 at stock 3.6
2 GTX 670s factory OC'd in SLI
16GB RAM


Any help?

 

[Proelite]

i'm having issues running the game, i'm getting really low fps


The game defaulted me to high and that was too much so I changed it to medium.
Problem is in battle with a castle I get around 15 FPS. World map is fine, The opening cinematic can drop to single digits.

I'm on Windows 10
I7 3820 at stock 3.6
2 GTX 670s factory OC'd in SLI
16GB RAM


Any help?

Get a better single card GPU?
670s are really old. Dont know if the game scakes well with SLI.