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Showing posts from April, 2017

Total War Attila is being malicious

I am playing a "Franks" campaign in Total War Attila and having a bad time of it. I am currently at war with six other factions each of whom seems able to field multiple full armies while I struggle along with depleted units and a few mercenaries. The Thuringians are being particularly annoying at present and after overwhelming my tentative attempts at expansion they followed my armies home with two large armies intent on destruction. For some reason (perhaps related to difficulty setting) they just seem to be better than my armies. Their troops are more robust in battle than mine and they seem to replenish faster between battles. Particularly annoying is the fact that they seem to be able to travel further than I can in a move. They always seem to be able to catch my armies when the odds are in their favour while I am unable to catch them when the situation is reversed. Happily they finally made a mistake. Their main stack captured one of my settlements (a crushing defeat, r

Total Warhammer: Dwarves and their grudges

My biggest mistake with the dwarven campaign in Total War Warhammer was not really playing it until after I had already spend a lot of time with other factions (Empire, Bordelaux and Vampires). Having a good grasp of the basic game world and game mechanics from those other campaigns the only challenge remaining is dealing with the strengths and weaknesses of the dwarves themselves. Dwarven strengths:  Even low level dwarven warriors are very tough  and tend to win battles just by standing still and letting the enemy come to them. Dwarves have easy access to some of the best ranged troops and artillery in the game. The dwarven economy is very strong so it is easy for them to make lots of money. The dwarven building tree is very streamlined that and allows a player relatively quick access to high quality units. The dwarven starting position is easy to defend with nearby access to weak green skin armies and settlements for early game combat experience. Dwarves have a huge te

For The Lady: Total Warhammer Bordelaux Campaign

Confession time: The Bordelaux campaign is the first full total war campaign that I have completed since Napoleon. I have explained before that Total War campaign games have a habit of bogging down into tedium so I usually give up before achieving the final campaign objectives. The fact that I persevered this time reinforces my belief that Warhammer is indeed the best Total War game to date. The Bordelaux campaign is a free DLC campaign that was only released in February but it is both unusual and interesting so I can highly recommend it. Bordelaux like all Bretonnians are a knighly race who love their horses and put chivalry above everything. Indeed the main victory condition for the Bordelaux campaign is to amass sufficient chivalry. Chivalry governs how you must play a Bordelaux campaign. Several common actions such as raiding, ambushing and pillaging human settlements  actually cause you lose chivalry so they are best avoided. Victory on the battlefield gains chivalry while de