Tomb kings campaing mechanics improvements.

Deep_echo_sound

Hello.
For supporting players and C.A. knowledge.

Tomb kings need to double their limit of units per building via techs or some achievement in campaign, like after attaining 4 or 6 books of Nagash. Or even all 8 in mortal empire campaign. Make it ultimate reward then please.

And second thing, they need additions and improvement on mortuary cult.
Particularly on legions of legends. Like a new dynasty, all special mortuary cult units must have and option to be awakened multiple times.
And, please, add all 3 heroes types to awaken. "Hero capacity: +1 for all heroes". For the same cost as awakening new dynasty.
So awakening not only for lords, because new awakened army with a new lord but with no physical option to add a hero is very frustrating.

sandercohen

You want the biggest snowball faction in the game to snowball even harder? Nah. If you want higher limits perhaps you should look for mods. Collecting five books and finishing the mission already gives TK faction-wide regeneration, which is a huge reward for completing the campaign.

I believe the LoLs function like RoRs and can be recruited again after they've been dismissed or killed. If you mean being able to recruit more of them, well it kinda takes away their novelty as they're supposed to be kinda like RoRs except they're called differently for whatever reason.

As for hero capacity, I think it's easy to get loads of tomb princes. The only thing I would agree to is more priests. In my last campaign I found myself short on them, so maybe some techs should give +2 instead of +1

Other than that, I feel like they're in a right spot. They're not my favorite, but their faction feels thematic and they're in a good spot right now.

darkgaia01

tomb kings are actually one of the best races in the game. the only thing tomb kings need is their lich high priest for a second generic lord choice.

Boombastek

TK very strong. All time had high tier units in army. Yes you can't made all armies from sphinx, but you had 5 single entities units.

Plus every lord had aoe heal, on ultra 1k healing for only cooldown, without cost.

If you made army mostly single entities/low number in squad, you can heal whole your army like hell.

Example 4 armies reinforce each other, if you remove check mark and made battle only 20v20. At battle start just retreat with 3 units, as reinforcements will come 3 lords. So you had army 4 lords and 16 units vs enemy 20. And each lord had aoe heal 1k hp with cooldown 60 seconds.

Your army just refuse to die.
And ofc crafting items, made from lords super powerful units.
TK craft > dwarf

Deep_echo_sound

They are nowhere near at "snowballing" compared to high elves, dark elves and even new Bretonnia, which has 5000 gold cost confederations with the whole new Bretonnian factions every 4 or 5 turns. And no supply lanes. This is "snowballing".
And high and dark elves economy? With unlimited dragons stacks? When tomb king even by early-middle game forced to use basic skeletons (if, like, not all building slots wasted for recruitment buildings and no economy and defense). When others have shades (great weapons), swordmasters of Hoeth and sisters of Avelorn armies by that time.
They are good. But, not near as "snowballing" before you have minimum like 20 full provinces with level 4 or 5 buildings. Elves can be as strong with like 3 provinces. And Bretonnia will have 20 provinces, with their new confederation, 3 times faster.
So, few at least late game adjustments will help to stay in line.

sandercohen

Seems like we're playing different games, then. I recently completed a TK vortex campaign on legendary as Khemri, and it was one of the easiest campaigns I've ever done and I completed it in about 100 turns. By the time I finished I hadn't even conquered all of Nehekara yet; yet I was having stacks comprised entirely of Ushabti with plenty of tier 4 and 5 constructs thrown in the mix. Dark Elves and High elves are severely constrained by supply lines and TK has no such problem whatsoever. Therefore, the TK has the ability to project power in far more areas at a much faster pace than the aforementioned factions.

It's literally impossible to have negative upkeep so even if your enemies start wrecking your settlements you can still maintain your armies and never have to cut units to save costs; making settlement losses not nearly as punishing as on other factions.

RikRiorik

I just wish there was something you could do to be able to get more heroes. Capping out at 10ish of each at most irks me. Especially when playing Arkhan and looking to get as many Liche Priests with the Knowledgeable trait on the map as possible for that sweet Winds of Magic Power Reserve. Arkhan’s Cabal needs more fuel!

As for the unit limitations they are only ever problematic in the beginning of the game where you are struggling foremost with a lack of money to build military buildings. As soon as you start rolling in money and settlements you can ignore unit limits more or less.

And controlling just the desert parts of the Southlands you can support a humungous amount of high tier stacks. I mostly just consolidate Ancient Nehekhara and then turn it into a fortress and let the rest of the world do whatever it pleases while I go around with a stack or two and have fun.

Deep_echo_sound

"No heroes" is a very bad limit to armies, yes!
But player still can not fill all 8 armies with the best units. Basic or even bow ushabti are not interesting, with their abysmal low stats. So, basic skeletons or nehekhara warriors still in the late game? Or you can have 152 hierotitans by that late game? When they are hard limited by number of provinces (not regions). No? No.
So, end game bonus of doubling unit limit from the buildings will help to finally transit at least at turn 150+ to real late domination impressions as a reward for player!

Bereaver

Deep_echo_sound said:

"No heroes" is a very bad limit to armies, yes!
But player still can not fill all 8 armies with the best units. Basic or even bow ushabti are not interesting, with their abysmal low stats. So, basic skeletons or nehekhara warriors still in the late game? Or you can have 152 hierotitans by that late game? When they are hard limited by number of provinces (not regions). No? No.
So, end game bonus of doubling unit limit from the buildings will help to finally transit at least at turn 150+ to real late domination impressions as a reward for player!

Ehm, you can get Sphynx Carver trait for Necrotect, Necrotect has skill for +1 more Warsphinx, you can get 9 of Necrotects with tech, Book of Nagash and from the event at begining. It means 18 Warsphinxes, you can also spam all three tier 5 building in each province capital. You can totally fill ALL of your 17 armies (or more) with t5 units lategame.

I would love to have a Mortuary Cult research for additional hero capacity though.

Deep_echo_sound

Bereaver said:

Ehm, you can get Sphynx Carver trait for Necrotect, Necrotect has skill for +1 more Warsphinx, you can get 9 of Necrotects with tech, Book of Nagash and from the event at begining. It means 18 Warsphinxes, you can also spam all three tier 5 building in each province capital. You can totally fill ALL of your 17 armies (or more) with t5 units lategame.

I would love to have a Mortuary Cult research for additional hero capacity though.

What if I do not like khemrian warsphinxes units? And do not like to be forced to picked something?
If I want to fill my armies with necrosphinxes and hierotitans? Let's count. 2 of these units per 1 whole province. To fill only 16 of them in every of mentioned 17 armies we need total of 272 units. Divided by two, this will result in 136 level 5 provinces...
I do not even know if we have so many provinces in the game at all?
Anyway, who needs this when 100% of the map already painted in your color? Maybe it will be nice to have this army composition opportunity at least at point of owning half or one third of the world. When player can conquer the other part of the world using her/his dreamed armies.
And have potential opportunity for multi mortuary cult units awakened for the money and resources, in which we invested so much time.

Bereaver

Double post.

Bereaver

Your premise was that Tomb Kings are bad at snowballing. But with 9 Necrotects and thirty major settlements you get 59 War Spinxes, 31 Hiero Titans, 31 Necro Spinxes. No other faction can do something as stupid as this.

Deep_echo_sound

Oh... I do not even know, how people that actually played game, not for a few hours, and have a deep knowledge of it (I hope, some users on this forum are) can write something like this...
30 major settlements? 30 provinces... Ask some anti-high elves agenda spreaders how much can do high elves that have 30 level 5 provinces. They can have like 20 stacks full of star dragons by that point. At least 10 times more tier 5 units that are, at the same time, more expensive than tomb kings' units.

Do you guys ever even played high elves or dark elves campaigns? When 1 province can give you like 100 000 gold per turn, free 2 tomb kings units vs 80 star or black dragons, supported by that economy might, of just one province, is like nothing. 60 of level 5 units from 30 provinces is nothing when player can have 600 dragons as dark or high elf.

And I do not said that they are bad (in early campaign especially) but at snowballing they are second-grade.

I am for every faction to have their O.P. late game staff.
Right now even Bretonnia (who has 0 supply lanes, which is good) is two heads above tomb kings in middle and late game. And tomb kings are paid DLC.
C.A., please give us O.P. fun staff at least at the end of campaign. Because right now they can not confederate, they have so many other limits.

RikRiorik

Oh if you want to field 150 Hierotitans that’s going to be hard. I don’t know how boring that would be though.

I certainly wouldn’t want to do it. But if one would want it in the endest of games then having an end tech that doubles up on unit limits could be a thing to keep the earlier parts of the campaign more interesting.

My point about the TKs stand though. You can have a shedload of high tier balanced armies by controlling relatively little land.

sandercohen

Deep_echo_sound said:

Do you guys ever even played high elves or dark elves campaigns? When 1 province can give you like 100 000 gold per

By abusing game mechanics.

Deep_echo_sound said:

They can have like 20 stacks full of star dragons by that point

Relative strength of TK increases as the difficulty goes up. I doubt you'll see 20 stacks of star dragons on legendary. Perhaps on easy and normal as the supply lines are much more lenient. Meanwhile TK doesn't give a **** about supply lines.

Your idea of fun is centered around being completely overpowered. I don't think we should balance the game around that axiom. There are mods that remove all limits on TK units, so you should try that instead of advocating for these changes.

Deep_echo_sound

sandercohen said:

By abusing game mechanics.

These are inappropriate words. Every game won by "abusing game mechanics". Because this is a game. They have conditionality with which smart player work in efficient way.

And yes, late game fun is to become absolutely overpowered. Well, for many players.
Like in R.P.G. too, to create the strongest character to totally dominate. Can't deny it.

sandercohen

If people like being so overpowered, why then do most players quit their campaign midgame after it has become obvious they'll just steamroll all opposition and it's no longer a question of if they could dominate the globe, but when. Where's the fun in having stacks of twenty star dragons when you know there's no chance in hell anyone is going to defeat that? There's no longer any tactics, skill or excitement involved in winning these type of battles. They essentially all play out the same.

As for in game mechanics; nobody forces you to abuse them, such as stacking tons of nobles in Lothren. You use the mechanics in such a way that the developers never intended it to be used, or at least weren't aware beforehand that such synergies existed. If you think a singleplayer game is about playing as efficiently as possible and you can't help yourself but to create doomstacks and abuse mechanics; then the problem quite clearly isn't the game, but it's you.

It's great that you mention RPG's because that's a perfect example of games where people deliberately restrict themselves in order to fulfill a role or play a certain build.

Like I said, there are mods that give you unlimited build options. So I'd say your needs are covered and there's no need for CA to change it now.

ShiroAmakusa75

The exaxt opposite is necessary, their caps need to be way more strict.

Deep_echo_sound

sandercohen said:

If you think a singleplayer game is about playing as efficiently as possible and you can't help yourself but to create doomstacks and abuse mechanics; then the problem quite clearly isn't the game, but it's you.

Problem... It is seems like some people have problem with basic understanding. Proceeding with personal insults.

Ephraim_Dalton said:

The exaxt opposite is necessary, their caps need to be way more strict.

Thankfully, this is not multiplayer balance, when many users from this forum, just want to make everything bad and weak, and actually require "skill", insane clicking in reality, to work somehow.
This mind pattern is bad in multiplayer and even worse in single player.
Give customers their O.P. toys as a reward in the late game.
Make the game legendary word domination in the end. Not a constant struggling with a game that is working in not fair, but exclusively anti-player manner, for 200+ turns.
That what restrictions, and proposed by some players, even more restrictions will do.

ShiroAmakusa75

Deep_echo_sound said:

sandercohen said:

If you think a singleplayer game is about playing as efficiently as possible and you can't help yourself but to create doomstacks and abuse mechanics; then the problem quite clearly isn't the game, but it's you.

Problem... It is seems like some people have problem with basic understanding. Proceeding with personal insults.

Ephraim_Dalton said:

The exaxt opposite is necessary, their caps need to be way more strict.

Thankfully, this is not multiplayer balance, when many users from this forum, just want to make everything bad and weak, and actually require "skill", insane clicking in reality, to work somehow.
This mind pattern is bad in multiplayer and even worse in single player.
Give customers their O.P. toys as a reward in the late game.
Make the game legendary word domination in the end. Not a constant struggling with a game that is working in not fair, but exclusively anti-player manner, for 200+ turns.
That what restrictions, and proposed by some players, even more restrictions will do.

Playing on easy gives you all the powertripping you need. People who actually want to have their skill tested need something too however.

Deep_echo_sound

This is not some real time strategy for "skill test". Read: "click fest". With strict resources and time. Turn based strategy is about... Strategy! Wow... And strategy is multiplier, smart working on campaign map - easier battles.
And play on hard, but not against playing on normal, it is just that game has this "avoid player" mechanic on normal difficulty. I do not like A.I. to cheat much.
Plus, this challenge-driven part of players are relatively small. Maybe like 1 of 10 maximum.
If someone still needs this so badly, then they should ask C.A. for new, insane difficulty when the A.I. will cheat even more.
Or hope C.A. will make machine-learning A.I. for battles and campaign and then... Well, all of us will be dead from the turn 1 already.
Game, in the current state, is challenging for basic player that had 0 experience with "total war". Or, for an average total war player with some past game experience. And to her/him, very hard and legendary difficulties are quite challenging. For the first time campaigns especially. And company need to hear them, because they are the backbone of financial success.
Sorry to say, but even maniacal micro focused games like "starcraft" has very easy campaigns for pro-players, that can abuse them at the highest difficulties like piece of cake. There can be no challenge in the game for wide audience, after certain point of knowing it, or so called "skill" (neurotic fast clicking).
This rare people just need the bravery to accept the truth.

RikRiorik

I would personally get zero satisfaction out of fielding the same stack of 19 Star Dragons again and again. Maybe a single stack like that once in a blue moon. I don’t even think I’ve ever fielded more than 3 Dragons in any stack ever.

As for the Tomb Kings their current restrictions only slightly impact my stacks in that I have to vary them a bit and even then is mostly because I don’t expand to own vast swathes of land.

ShiroAmakusa75

Deep_echo_sound said:

This is not some real time strategy for "skill test". Read: "click fest". With strict resources and time. Turn based strategy is about... Strategy! Wow... And strategy is multiplier, smart working on campaign map - easier battles.
And play on hard, but not against playing on normal, it is just that game has this "avoid player" mechanic on normal difficulty. I do not like A.I. to cheat much.
Plus, this challenge-driven part of players are relatively small. Maybe like 1 of 10 maximum.
If someone still needs this so badly, then they should ask C.A. for new, insane difficulty when the A.I. will cheat even more.
Or hope C.A. will make machine-learning A.I. for battles and campaign and then... Well, all of us will be dead from the turn 1 already.
Game, in the current state, is challenging for basic player that had 0 experience with "total war". Or, for an average total war player with some past game experience. And to her/him, very hard and legendary difficulties are quite challenging. For the first time campaigns especially. And company need to hear them, because they are the backbone of financial success.
Sorry to say, but even maniacal micro focused games like "starcraft" has very easy campaigns for pro-players, that can abuse them at the highest difficulties like piece of cake. There can be no challenge in the game for wide audience, after certain point of knowing it, or so called "skill" (neurotic fast clicking).
This rare people just need the bravery to accept the truth.

What do harder unit restrictions to do with "clickfest"?

Easy elite spam means the game requires less strategy. You want more elite spam, ergo you want less strategy.

Goatforce

Deep_echo_sound said:

sandercohen said:

If you think a singleplayer game is about playing as efficiently as possible and you can't help yourself but to create doomstacks and abuse mechanics; then the problem quite clearly isn't the game, but it's you.

Problem... It is seems like some people have problem with basic understanding. Proceeding with personal insults.

Ephraim_Dalton said:

The exaxt opposite is necessary, their caps need to be way more strict.

Thankfully, this is not multiplayer balance, when many users from this forum, just want to make everything bad and weak, and actually require "skill", insane clicking in reality, to work somehow.
This mind pattern is bad in multiplayer and even worse in single player.
Give customers their O.P. toys as a reward in the late game.
Make the game legendary word domination in the end. Not a constant struggling with a game that is working in not fair, but exclusively anti-player manner, for 200+ turns.
That what restrictions, and proposed by some players, even more restrictions will do.

If you think skill in this game is the same as "insane clicking" then it is you who has a problem with basic understanding. Also it is rather telling that you claim people are resorting to insults straight after insulting them.

As Ephraim rightly points out, if you don't want the game to present a challenge, play on easy mode, it is strange that you seem to think that the game should cease to challenge the player in the late game (though in truth the problem with the end game is the lack of challenge, players can bulldoze and Chaos is a dud). As has been said, TKs can access huge numbers of T5 units in the late game using buildings and Necrotects, the rewards are there for players.

MonochromaticSpider

Deep_echo_sound said:

Oh... I do not even know, how people that actually played game, not for a few hours, and have a deep knowledge of it (I hope, some users on this forum are) can write something like this...
30 major settlements? 30 provinces... Ask some anti-high elves agenda spreaders how much can do high elves that have 30 level 5 provinces. They can have like 20 stacks full of star dragons by that point. At least 10 times more tier 5 units that are, at the same time, more expensive than tomb kings' units.

Do you guys ever even played high elves or dark elves campaigns? When 1 province can give you like 100 000 gold per turn, free 2 tomb kings units vs 80 star or black dragons, supported by that economy might, of just one province, is like nothing. 60 of level 5 units from 30 provinces is nothing when player can have 600 dragons as dark or high elf.

And I do not said that they are bad (in early campaign especially) but at snowballing they are second-grade.

I am for every faction to have their O.P. late game staff.
Right now even Bretonnia (who has 0 supply lanes, which is good) is two heads above tomb kings in middle and late game. And tomb kings are paid DLC.
C.A., please give us O.P. fun staff at least at the end of campaign. Because right now they can not confederate, they have so many other limits.

You can't push a single provice to 100k gold if you're only owning that one province. You need loads and loads and loads of income-buffing heroes stacking their bonuses to get that high, and you can't recruit that many with just one province.

That 100k gold thing is something you can amuse yourself with in the late game.

As for TK, you do need to expand quite a bit, and then wait for the expanded area to grow up, but you're missing a crucial detail. TK global recruitment is free. And with enough recruitment buildings around your empire, the recruitment time will drop. Eventually you will have 1 turn global recruitment of everything.

In other words, you really don't need to have 10 stacks of nothing but hierotitans, because you can move them across the world if you want to. Disband and recruit, mix and match, everything is completely expendable.

RikRiorik

Also the only late game ”staff” of any note is the Staff of Nagash. Wielded by Arkhan. And nobody gets to take tvst staff off of my favourite dudemeister.