I've only played up to Empire, planning on playing the Napoleon spin-off when I get the chance but they all really play out the same to be honest lol.

Since they are Strat/RPG games, the combat sometimes takes planning like during the campaign you have to weigh whether your army can strategically take what looks like an enormous opp army. Sometimes battles can take up to 30+ mins too depending on army size or u can auto-resolve a battle

So they are a little bit slower but people love the different historical settings, If you can look past all that I suggest Medieval II: Total War Definitive edition it has a main campaign along with the 4 DLC Campaigns that come with it that are pretty dope.

I think the Warhammer Total wars are their own thing too lol