How do I play Skarbrand in IE

[Aurora]

He seems way harder in IE than in the realms of chaos map.
Bad location, bad terrain that takes too much time to move across and reduces the RAGE meter. Province growth tied to fighting, but can't have enough armies. Just constantly rebuilding my losses.
Everyone declares war, but I can only have 1 army. Khemri dumps Skarbrand with archers and flooding.
Can't see how to make him a one-man-army. Level 31 and gets creamed by Settra and another stack.

[slavka]

keep fighting everyone and dont be afraid to be in the red constantly

[Aurora]

I heard that one before, doesn't work because negative means attrition.
Or is Skarbrand immune to attrition from being out of money?

[TheBuch]

No it means you are losing money per turn (on income) but staying in the black overall by fighting battles.

[Garatgh Deloi]

Originally posted by Aurora:

I heard that one before, doesn't work because negative means attrition.
Or is Skarbrand immune to attrition from being out of money?

Not 0 money left. Negative income. As in you can get enough money from battles to offset the negatives in your passive income.

[Cryten]

The risk with skarbrand is ending up on the wrong side of the world. He can maintain constant fighting for income right up until he is needed 4 provinces in the opposite direction through his own territory. Still you should be able to hold some territory with a cheap secondary army. Its just his provinces are hard to defend and skarbrand does not defend at all.

[DarkFenix]

Skarbrand really doesn't care about location. So long as there are enemies to murder, he's in the right place. Rage meter reducing a little really doesn't matter, sure it's nice to keep it maxed, but there's no special bonus for doing so.

And... Khemri dumps Skarbrand? How? Are you giving your army hold position orders and waiting for them to empty all their ammo into you before you touch the controls again? Skarbrand on his own murders pretty much their whole faction, the units are more or less along for the ride. It's so easy to roll over Tomb Kings that I actually can't figure out how you could possibly lose, it's literally a case of throwing your army at them and watching your far superior roster crush them.

What's this about one army? You can spawn a free army every time you raze a settlement, one that gets progressively larger and stronger as you progress along the research tree. Sure, those armies frequently had bad comps and will get run over by real enemy stacks, but who cares when it was free in the first place? Or just recruit more armies, each army can easily sustain itself off sack money so long as you throw it into a target-rich environment.

I get the feeling you're trying to play Skarbrand like a normal faction, sitting back and trying to make a conventional economy. I can't think of any other way Settra could still be an issue by the time Skarbrand is level 31, he's one of your immediate neighbours, by that level you should long since have kicked down his front door and murdered him to death.

Skarbrand is the very definition of a hyper-aggressive faction. You should never stop moving, never stop sacking and razing. Keep a steady stream of free armies splitting off from your main stack and sacking/razing softer targets. Skarbrand himself makes your main stack unbeatable with his horrifying melee stats and 0.3% per second regeneration. You only need to develop one settlement for recruitment, everything else is little more than an expendable outpost for spreading corruption. The only map painting Skarbrand does is with the blood of your enemies and the ashes of their cities.

[Aurora]

No, it was Settra + another stack, with regiments of renown.
Skarbrand was torn apart by Ushabti Greatbows, tarpitted by skellies/Tomb Guard.
I only had 4 Exalted bloodletters (that lost to Tomb Guard somehow) and some chaos warriors, because Volkmar and the Dwarfs are also wrecking my ♥♥♥♥.
I can't really get any good units besides Exalted Bloodletters and some Skullcannons.
How do I make Skarbrand a one man army? I didn't even get to do the quest battle for his axes yet because I died early.
And whenevr I manage to kill Settra, he's just back 4 turns later, that's not enough time to refill my army because Exalted Bloodletters and other stuff needs 2 turns.

[Cryten]

Take his unique line for bloodgreed, research the regeration banner and give it to skarbrand in tier 1 tech, after getting a little bit of redline for troops get his combat line filled or at least the better parts. He should stomp infantry and single targets and can run down archers with ease. Use his taunt ability near archers to force them into melee. Breath fire on chaff or just walk through them. Skarbrand might need coaxing but he easily has enough mass to push from infantry.

Also use your troops. they hit hard, warriors on soft targets, demons on hard targets, bloodthirsters on large targets. Dont be dumb and leave one of your big guys surrounded by archers, use your army. Skarbrand speed should also get him places if you need him to move away from archers.

You can replace bloodletters with minotaurs in the mid game, leaving blood crushers for your demon troops.

[Cacomistle]

I just did early-mid game in another skarbrand campiagn. Something I learned, the chaos lords on gorebeast chariots are super good especially with skarbrand.

Skarbrand's biggest issue imo is lots of cheap trash infantry. He kills anything he touches, regardless of how elite those units are, so the more enemies you fight the worse it is for him. That makes the best unit to synergize with him a chariot, because they tear through everything. But the chaos lord on a gorebeast chariot also has like 700 armor piercing weapon strength, so they can outduel stuff too and kill single entities that aren't worth skarbrand's time as well as racking up hundreds of infantry kills.

I basically just followed skarbrand around early game with a chaos lord and a herald of khorne, I kind of let the bloodletters die in auto resolve (still had 1 in his army) since chaos warriors and marauder dual weapons are better vs your early game opponents, and I took only capital settlements and built them up asap. I stayed green income for quite a while by going cheap with my main army, since skarbrand can wipe most stuff himself anyways, and if you see a tough army you can spawn a blood host. I used all the post battle income to build up the capitals with garrisons so I wouldn't lose them, and because I had 3 lords they grew really fast.

And then after taking out bloody handz, I went straight down for thorek cause that piece of ♥♥♥♥ always declares war on you, and sure enough he did. I spawned blood hosts from a few of his cities, and just moved them into khalida's territory (her and kroq gar both declared war on me too) to raze a few settlements. The buffer of razed settlements slows the ai down in attacking you a lot it seems.

[DarkFenix]

Skarbrand's axes I actually got really late. The quest battle is fairly brutal too, CA have done a good job making those in TWW3.

As for one-man-army Skarbrand, just max the yellow line, give him the skill for the 0.1% per second regen, and research the banner for another 0.2% regen. Use his sheer mass to push through infantry and target down enemy ranged. His ability to make enemy units rampage is great for dragging them into melee too.

My early army was mostly bloodletters, a few warriors, some dogs, couple of furies. Not entirely sure, I didn't much care because Skarbrand himself did so much of the work, I seldom bothered fully replenishing units before moving on to the attack again, Skarbrand's ungodly regen keeps him topped up, a big battle might cap out his healing and see him take permanent damage, but then I'd take an easy battle and he'd fill right back up.

Fancy units like exalted bloodletters and bloodthirsters are nice, but in Skarbrand's stack they're ultimately unnecessary. Skarbrand's stack doesn't actually need to consist of more than a bunch of bodies to run interference for big red.

[Cacomistle]

Oh also I think its good to save up a lot of money, and get garrisons in each settlement. Then, if you see an ai coming to attack you, you can just reactively recruit an army there, beat back their army with the help of the garrison, finish recruiting, and then go kill them. Alternatively, you can just save up a bunch, then use it to recruit somewhat deep into the red, and blitz through all your enemies quickly, and you'll likely be able to maintain those armies from sacking/post battle loot. I tend to prefer basically waiting for an enemy to attack me, and when they do I recruit a reactive army, wipe their army, and at that point I already have stack so I might as well go kill them.

[Xeonzs]

I just cult teleported to the north after like 20-40 turns in the badlands and started capturing dark citadels there, I have 1 army waging war in the west, another in the east / chaos sea and Skarbrand is off fighting whoever declares war on me / the endgame scenario.

You make so much money from post battle loot and sacking that going 4000-5000 into minus isn't eve noticeable, I could probably afford more armies but that's what bloodhosts are for when I need them.

[Toblm]

Originally posted by Aurora:

He seems way harder in IE than in the realms of chaos map.
Bad location, bad terrain that takes too much time to move across and reduces the RAGE meter. Province growth tied to fighting, but can't have enough armies. Just constantly rebuilding my losses.
Everyone declares war, but I can only have 1 army. Khemri dumps Skarbrand with archers and flooding.
Can't see how to make him a one-man-army. Level 31 and gets creamed by Settra and another stack.

You can always cult-teleport elsewhere in the world if the starting area isnt to your liking.
Cults are most likely to pop in the wastes which can be a nice rampage to get a power base before Korne-ing the rest of the world.

[Ashley]

Yeah I really don't like Khorne atm. I like their armies but by god their garrisons and economy are trash. I feel like personally Valkia is the way to go for Khorne esc factions. Not poor thanks to dark fortresses and good enough economy you can afford an army per fortress and good defense in the fortresses.

Khorne isn't even building tall or wide. Just small and sad. Or maybe that's just a sign they really went overboard with WoC rework and dlc.

[Wraff]

Sack a town one turn. Then raze it the next. It gives you more money and more rampage score. Always take anything that reduces your unit upkeep/recruitment and improves the amount you get from sacking.

Only ever colonize a capital. All minor settles will come free in that region after doing so. Dont worry about losing minor settlements as Skarbrand is mostly about offense and not defense. So just try to kill opposing factions as quickly as possible to secure those regions. Upgrade responsibly because you're always on a budget.

Remember. Do not rely on your buildings for income passive income. It doesnt exist. If you're not fighting and winning. Then you're not making money or population growth.