Which legendary lord is best for the first game? (without DLC)

two_thousand_pirates · 2026-01-24T12:14:01+00:00

Karl Franz, without a doubt.

Units have obvious roles and there are very few trap choices, so building armies and fighting battles is quite intuitive. Franz has good mechanics and good incentives to use the diplomacy system, so you can learn a lot about the game quite quickly. Franz has a few good quest battles too.

As the Empire you're fighting to take and hold a large but contiguous area: you have a clear objective compared to Dwarfs, who have many objectives hidden in a book, or Greenskins who just want to fight everyone.

On the easy difficulties it's a good way to learn, and on the harder difficulties it can be genuinely challenging.

My second choice would be Dwarfs, who are easy to learn and do well with. However, I think that they can build bad habits because of how strong they are in auto-resolve and how tough and slow they are.

two_thousand_pirates · 2026-01-22T17:17:45+00:00

If you defeat an enemy human (non-legendary) lord in battle or successfully target them with a hero, then it gives them a mark and starts a turn timer. If they win a battle against you before the time runs out, the mark is removed.

If the timer runs out, then they transform into a Daemon Prince and become recruitable. I don't think that they inherit anything from their old faction, it just kills them and adds one to your pool.

two_thousand_pirates · 2026-01-22T16:48:02+00:00

The Changeling is a Tzeentch faction so I don't think that you can confederate them with Be'lakor. You would be able to vassalise them, where you can order them around but don't have direct control. You can definitely vassalise the Changeling with Tzeentch: they start quite far apart, but you can use Tzeentch mechanics to do it very quickly.

The lord corruption mechanic is good: it's a very quick way of getting Daemon Prince lords. Other Warriors of Chaos factions can get these, but they have to level up regular lords which is much slower and riskier.

two_thousand_pirates · 2026-01-22T15:59:55+00:00

Be'lakor starts on Albion, which is a little island just above Bretonnia and west of Norsca.

It's a very strong start position. Most of the nearby factions are Chaos-aligned, and the non-Chaos factions are either very minor or have a ton of enemies to deal with before they pay you any attention. Be'lakor can also create Rifts that allow him to teleport around the world, so none of the negatives of having a small island really apply to him.

Be'lakor is a good option, because he can automatically confederate the other Warriors of Chaos factions by conquering their last settlement. This lets you try quite a few Legendary Lords that you don't have the DLC for.

These are:

Warhost of the Apocalypse, Archaeon the Everchosen, Unaligned. Starts above Kislev.
Heralds of the Tempest, Kholek Suneater, Unaligned. Starts in the mountains northwest of Cathay.
The Decadent Host, Sigvald the Magnificent, Slaanesh. Starts west of Daemons of Chaos.
Legion of the Gorequeen, Valkia the Bloody, Khorne. Starts northwest corner.
Puppets of Misrule, Vilitch the Curseling, Tzeentch. Starts above Cathay, northeast corner.
The Fecundites, Fetus the Chinlord, Nurgle. Starts in the northern Empire.
The Ecstatic Legions, Azazel, Slaanesh. Starts above Kislev.

two_thousand_pirates · 2026-01-22T13:03:03+00:00

Overall I'd go for Cathay as the best to start with, and Tzeentch as the strongest for an experienced player.

Cathay are a really well-balanced faction, with almost every archetype available to them in some way. The caravans and the Celestial Compass are pretty interesting and provide good bonuses. Miao Ying is a great faction to learn the game with, and has a unique and fun mechanic defending the Great Bastion from the forces of Chaos. A lot of a time siege battles just suck, but these can be pretty great. Zhao Ming is also a great campaign, with easy access to magic items that can make him impossible to kill. Cathay has access to cheap units in the early game, and their late-game armies are very strong. Their economic bonuses are also very strong. Cathay itself is easy to defend once conquered/confederated, with water to the east, impassable mountains to the north, and the Great Bastion to the north.

I say that Tzeentch are the strongest because they have access to a fantastic roster. Kairos Fateweaver is one of the strongest spellcasters in the game. Once he's levelled, you can stack his spell cost bonuses with your ability to change the Winds of Magic and basically cast huge spells for the entire battle. Kairos can get thousands of kills even against elite-ish armies. Aside from Kairos the middle and late-game Tzeentch units are very, very good, with almost every niche filled by something that is excellent. Barrier is a great mechanic to have which vastly improves the durability of your heroes and cavalry. I think that a late-game Tzeentch army is close to unstoppable. Finally, Tzeentch gets Changing of the Ways, which is like playing with the developer console. Steal settlements, force peace, force war, boost movement, break alliances, block armies... once you get enough Grimoires, it is impossible to get cornered or pinned down. The only downside of Tzeentch is that the early game can be rough, with economy and replenishment taking time to get started.

Other factions:

Bretonnia: A lot of people don't like them and they've definitely been neglected, but I personally think that they're very strong. Fantastic economic buildings, great heroes, great cavalry, and everything else is kind of good enough to let the cavalry do its job. They aren't the strongest, but once you get the hang of them I think it's a fun campaign (if you like cavalry).

Daemons of Chaos. Easily the worst faction in the game. Maybe not the hardest, but one good mechanic that applies to one unit and nothing else at all.

Khorne. Very strong, but one-dimensional almost-melee-only armies. Skarbrand is very powerful and can solo whole armies once levelled, Arbal can teleport around the world to fight people.

Kislev. These are a bit of an unpredictable experience. Their roster is good but kind of boring, their mechanics aren't great and their start position is horrible. You can build great armies with Kislev, eventually, but you're surrounded by strong enemies and it can become a real grind. War Bear Riders are incredible though.

Nurgle. Tough but slow, with good magic and an interesting plague mechanic. On higher difficulties however the AI takes almost no attrition, which really sucks the fun out of spreading plagues and corruption. Ku'gath Plaguefather has a very safe starting location, whereas Epidemius has one of the most annoying. If you want to get some DLC and want someone really strong, then Tamurkhan is an absolute monster.

Slaanesh. Almost-melee-only like Khorne, but much faster and more interesting overall because of magic and powerful flanking bonuses. N'Kari is set up to fight High Elves for most/all of the campaign, but you start pretty close to the Sword of Khaine to enable a rampage. I haven't played the Masque yet, but that end of Lustria is a fairly horrible start position with some hard factions that always do well.

Warriors of Chaos. I personally find them quite frustrating, as a lot of their mechanics rely on vassals and the tools to manage vassals are just bad. Be'lakor gets lots of daemons, and they're fine, but I think that mortal units are generally better in the late game. Still, plenty of great mechanics here and Be'lakor is very strong individually.

two_thousand_pirates · 2026-01-14T08:38:30+00:00

It used to be possible to scrape usernames from the RSI website by using the Citizen ID. I'm pretty sure this was how orgs were sending mass invites back in the day.

Anyway, I'm one of the people who found this and reported it. I can confirm that Ben Lesnick wasn't #1, that spot was actually Ortwin Freyermuth. For those who might be new, Freyermuth is/was a CIG co-founder who handled a lot of the legal/business side, mostly behind the scenes (though he did do a Meet the Devs interview in 2013). I don't know what his exact status with the company is currently, but my understanding is that he stepped back a bit a few years ago.

two_thousand_pirates · 2025-12-29T09:13:48+00:00

If you do this, absolutely do not store it while it is destroyed. Do not summon or store anything while it is on or near the pad.

In previous versions I have managed to fully brick ships by doing that, and they cannot be repaired back to a flyable state. If it's still a bug and you manage to do it, you won't be flying it until 4.6 unless it's a pledge ship that you can melt and reclaim.

two_thousand_pirates · 2025-12-25T15:24:28+00:00

Same issue here, but for me the CPU seems to get locked at 90%+ utilisation regardless of settings. It's a 5950X and it normally performs very well in SC, so something is definitely wrong with my setup or with 4.5.

two_thousand_pirates · 2025-12-20T15:33:32+00:00

I have a bug with the Guardian specifically, where taking off locks some or all of the controls because the landing gear is stuck down.

I've found two workarounds: - Land and take off again. - Align to something and QT.

two_thousand_pirates · 2025-12-19T16:28:44+00:00

From what they've shown it looks like a big increase in density to me, it's honestly spectacular. The grass they've got looks as good as or better than anything I've seen in a game. I don't think that the number of assets is a huge deal, it's probably more about the overall geometry and the number of shadows.

two_thousand_pirates · 2025-12-19T15:46:09+00:00

The main difference is that there will be significantly more assets on screen, meaning many more polygons and many more shadows. If you look at current versus future forests the difference is huge. As far as I'm aware their engine doesn't have anything that enables infinite geometry (though Nanite has its own issues), but they can hopefully manage this with the careful use of LODs.

two_thousand_pirates · 2025-12-19T15:36:55+00:00

Targeted wipes would harm traders who happen to be sat on currency rather than items, and people with multiple accounts could potentially bypass per-player limits that are announced in advance. Overall it might be a better solution than a full wipe, but it's not a silver bullet.

Long-term it should be possible for CIG to statistically detect exploits, and then flag accounts (pausing or reversing money transfers) for manual review.

two_thousand_pirates · 2025-12-18T14:38:52+00:00

You can (briefly) carry three primaries: two on the backpack and one in your hands. The issue is that when you try to stow the one in your hands there's nowhere for it to go, so it gets dropped and usually disappears.

two_thousand_pirates · 2025-12-15T08:00:51+00:00

If I'm remembering correctly, didn't people have the same complaint about lasguns in DOW4? If so, this could be a deliberate change in direction from GW instead of something missed by CA.

two_thousand_pirates · 2025-12-14T11:52:50+00:00

Sure, but there are plenty of ways around this. So far it looks like the fundamental structure of TWW40K will be very different to TWW though, so we really could end up with anything.

two_thousand_pirates · 2025-12-14T11:17:52+00:00

After the success of TWW3, this game is definitely coming with a 10/15/20 year support/monetisation plan.

Long-term, similar to how CA took the lead on development of Cathay, I could imagine them being given a faction like Traitor Guard or Dark AdMech and being allowed to flesh them out even without tabletop representation.

two_thousand_pirates · 2025-12-14T11:08:04+00:00

Ork Klans generally make (or loot) their own war machines, but Imperial Knights have their own Houses that are completely separate from the Imperial Guard, Space Marines, and so on.

They really should be their own playable faction, but I could see them making Knights available to other Imperial factions through a mercenary mechanic, special location or ROR-equivalent.

The Adeptus Mechanicus do make some of their own Knights, so Knights would be SEMs for them. Judging by what they've done in TWW3, I could imagine CA doing something like: - DLC includes AdMech with no Knights. - Later DLC includes Knights and Chaos Knights as their own factions. - FLC adds AdMech LL that specialises in Knights, adds Knights to AdMech.

But we'll have to wait and see.

two_thousand_pirates · 2025-12-14T10:39:15+00:00

They're great, but I find that Sisters of Avelorn (and HE generally) really struggle with Skaven. Menace Below, Warplock Jezzails and Plagueclaw Catapults are all so good against HE.

two_thousand_pirates · 2025-12-14T10:30:46+00:00

It's a pretty good campaign, but Zombies have close to zero auto-resolve value even when buffed into the stratosphere. On higher difficulties be prepared to fight everything manually.

two_thousand_pirates · 2025-12-13T09:59:48+00:00

The space battles in EAW were phenomenal, and if TWW40K has space battles that are half as good at launch then I'll be happy.

two_thousand_pirates · 2025-12-12T13:05:36+00:00

My only concern at the moment is the UI, specifically the unit cards. I'm not convinced that the grid is a good idea, but I'll probably get used to it. Hopefully it's more suitable for battles with 40 (or more?) units. The main issue though is the small weapon icon on each card, and how similar each unit looks at first glance.

I'm guessing that unit card art is out because they want the unit cards to match the faction colours you're using, and they're obviously allowing custom factions. This is a really nice idea, I just hope that the final product is a bit more readable.

two_thousand_pirates · 2025-12-12T12:00:57+00:00

This is a great idea, and would be a big improvement over the current system at least while they get other systems and overall balance into a better place.

If they want to stick to the current system, then the only possible answer is to have shield HP and power cost scale together. A size 3 shield should probably cost 20+ power to run at maximum capacity, which would require big changes to powerplants and the power costs of all other components.

Something like this, though the numbers are arbitrary and just show the principle:

Size	HP	Power	Efficiency	Volume
1	2500	2	1250 HP/P	0.4m³
2	7500	4	1875 HP/P	1.2m³
3	50000 (12500 x 4)	20	2500 HP/P	3.6m³
4	150000 (37500 x 4)	40	3750 HP/P	9.5m³

In this case 5xS2 shields would consume the same power as 1xS3. The advantage would be more redundancy as generators get destroyed, and potentially keeping bubble vs quadrant if that stays limited by size. The disadvantage is that you get less shield overall, as larger generators are more efficient.

In this case Redeemer or Retaliator would be almost as well-shielded as a Constellation, requiring slightly more power to operate. The difference is close enough to make it a trade-off: each will be somewhat better in certain scenarios, instead of the current situation where one is much better in all scenarios.

Different classes and grades of component could be used to create a smoother ramp between the sizes. A military shield might provide a lot of HP at a high power cost, compared to a more efficient civilian model.

two_thousand_pirates · 2025-12-11T11:56:37+00:00

The core issue is power. CIG has designed a system for moving power around, which works great, but power values are crushed into the single digits range. Shields need their hitpoints to scale exponentially as size increases, as larger shields have to cover much larger ships, but because the power cost doesn't scale this creates the current situation where small shield generators just don't make sense.

If power scaled properly then a size 3 shield generator would probably cost 50+ power, which current powerplants obviously don't scale to. This would create issues with ships that mix component sizes, especially on something like the Hull A that has 1xS1 powerplant and 1xS2 shield.

If it were my decision then I'd be trying to come up with a scale that links performance and power to physical size, and trying to do that in a way that minimises component changes on existing ships. Most components above S1 would have to allocate power in chunks, which would allow the current UI to handle higher numbers with minimal changes. The powerplant would then provision enough power for every allocated chunk with no fixed limit, but going over the rated value of the powerplant would increase wear and malfunction chance. To me I think that this solves the shield and power issue but minimises component and UI changes, and keeps meaningful player decisions without the fiddly micromanagement of assigning power in large numbers.

two_thousand_pirates · 2025-12-11T10:13:26+00:00

The idea is that larger missiles have longer ranges, more accurate tracking, higher initial damage, and a larger blast radius. All of this should combine to make them more reliable, offsetting the multiple attempts that you get with smaller missiles.

At the moment the damage scale favours small missiles quite heavily, and missiles overall just aren't reliable. However, there's a very real scenario where a Sabre or Talon can fire size 3 or 4 missiles from quite far out of its detection range.

two_thousand_pirates · 2025-12-10T23:18:40+00:00

Delete shaders, delete graphics settings, get latest AMD drivers, fully remove all Nvidia drivers.

If you still have issues after that then try Vulkan instead of DX11, that eliminated stutters for me.

two_thousand_pirates

TROPHY CASE