Why Does Khorne's campaign (more specifically skarbrand's) suck so bad?

[TheDude]

Recently I have been trying to enjoy each individual Chaos God's immortal Empire campaigns, partially after seeing Blake's talk about the mistakes people make with the Kairos campaign. But Khorne's campaigns just seem to be impossible to enjoy, the units like Bloodthirstier being incredibly weak compared to other monsters of their size, the total lack of income you can get out of any settlement, being almost constantly on the verge of debt while trying to maintain upkeep on an even basic army, being forced to fight every single battle or suffer from a terrible causality replenishment rate, never being able to occupy settlements in time for your less than 10% chance to recolonize a settlement to kick in. it feels like trying to balance on a glass floor, it isn't helped that diplomacy is impossible and that his starting position pits him against perhaps the only faction that Khorne units don't get a lot of value on with savage orcs having almost no Armour and all physical resistance, Plus the battle abilities do almost nothing in the early game, being a weaker version of a basic Waagh that only givers a little melee attack. The faction's abilities are all thematically correct and would feel awesome, but every part of the campaign feels like it is being held down after playing Valkia you get the exact opposite effect, snowballing through the dark elves and norscans near you and playing exactly like a khorne faction should. Why doesn't skarbrand feel the same?

[Andrewbh2003]

i mean i enjoy it a lot

khorne is a faction that needs to be played in a specific way to do well with and i enjoy that personally

the nerfs made khrone actually difficult to do well with that i like ^^

[Mepho]

Skarbrand is the only chaos faction I find fun (mainly because of Skarbrand himself being a total unit and awsome looking) but I also get bored in Immortal Empires.
I blame the starting position. It's has one of the lower densities of settlements on the whole map plus the mountainous region to the east is a pain without underway or similars.

If he started in some spot with more places to wreck or at least better options than the ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ middle of the badlands he would probably feel better. Surely a place with a cluster of factions would fit his playstyle more than chasing orcs and dwarfes in the desert.
The nerfs didn't help either. I never quite understood why enforce a 5 turns cooldown on the skull throne since the whole faction is based on blitzing.

[The Grand Mugwump]

He's a giant, red wrecking ball of destruction and ruin. Go wherever the hell you want. I usually end up going straight north into the Empire because I don't want to bother with the desert/badlands or constantly playing tag in the mountains down there. Maybe it's a clue, but none of his victory conditions involve holding onto land. Just sack and raze everything and leave a few colonies here and there to slowly spread and make that basic level 1 settlement 100 income.

The secret to having fun with him is to sack everything first and only upgrade buildings in a few of the province capitals. He's supposed to go deep into the red on income. Just make sure you're making enough money from sacking with your many armies to afford it. Summon some of those free armies and use them to sack smaller settlements or chase down surviving armies which try to recolonize your ruins.

Also, his cult buildings can summon him to anywhere in the world. You're pretty much guaranteed to get at least one in the chaos wastes if you don't want to be harassed in the badlands.

Originally posted by TheDude:

his starting position pits him against perhaps the only faction that Khorne units don't get a lot of value on with savage orcs having almost no Armour and all physical resistance,

You do realize the starting bloodletters you can recruit on turn 1 do magic damage right? They devour the savage orks. lol

[SBA77]

Originally posted by TheDude:

Recently I have been trying to enjoy each individual Chaos God's immortal Empire campaigns, partially after seeing Blake's talk about the mistakes people make with the Kairos campaign. But Khorne's campaigns just seem to be impossible to enjoy, the units like Bloodthirstier being incredibly weak compared to other monsters of their size, the total lack of income you can get out of any settlement, being almost constantly on the verge of debt while trying to maintain upkeep on an even basic army, being forced to fight every single battle or suffer from a terrible causality replenishment rate, never being able to occupy settlements in time for your less than 10% chance to recolonize a settlement to kick in. it feels like trying to balance on a glass floor, it isn't helped that diplomacy is impossible and that his starting position pits him against perhaps the only faction that Khorne units don't get a lot of value on with savage orcs having almost no Armour and all physical resistance, Plus the battle abilities do almost nothing in the early game, being a weaker version of a basic Waagh that only givers a little melee attack. The faction's abilities are all thematically correct and would feel awesome, but every part of the campaign feels like it is being held down after playing Valkia you get the exact opposite effect, snowballing through the dark elves and norscans near you and playing exactly like a khorne faction should. Why doesn't skarbrand feel the same?

I'm curious have you tried Valkia yet, and if so what do you think of her campaign?

[KoboldUtopian]

The key to enjoying Skarbrand's campaign is embracing negative income. Just sack and raise everything for oodles of cash to support your many armies and only occupy the capitals.

[algame]

Skarbrand campaign is the most fun I have had with WH3, its like playing Attilla hordes dialed up to 1000. And I also played it at the beginning when you had to travel all over the map to kill the other demon factions.

No idea why they changed that, it was a fun and loreful campaign goal.

[Hex]

I raised 2-3 cities a turn once i got out of the Badlands Thunderdome. By mid game I had 300k in the bank while losing 50k a turn. If your economy isn't running like that your doing something wrong as Skarbrand.

[leandrombraz]

Originally posted by TheDude:

the total lack of income you can get out of any settlement, being almost constantly on the verge of debt while trying to maintain upkeep on an even basic army,

As Skarbrand, you can't just be on the verge of debt, you have to dive deep into debt and wear that red number like a badge. As long as you end the turn with enough gold to pay your debt, you're fine, and you can make enough gold just by sacking. Spawn as many Bloodhosts as you can, and don't be conservative with it just because of your economy. They are your economy.

Skarbrand is all about getting at least one battle per turn with each of your armies, which means you need to take risks and expose yourself. Abuse that march stance, both to get to far away settlements and to look like easy prey for the AI, since you want them to attack you.

[Darklordnj]

Originally posted by leandrombraz:

Originally posted by TheDude:

the total lack of income you can get out of any settlement, being almost constantly on the verge of debt while trying to maintain upkeep on an even basic army,

As Skarbrand, you can't just be on the verge of debt, you have to dive deep into debt and wear that red number like a badge. As long as you end the turn with enough gold to pay your debt, you're fine, and you can make enough gold just by sacking. Spawn as many Bloodhosts as you can, and don't be conservative with it just because of your economy. They are your economy.

Khorne is a big fan of the color red after all, more red the better.

[Magni]

Khorne is essentially the Greenskin economies' basic premise dialled up to 11: Your economy is killing people and taking their stuff.

[DerRitter]

I hate that he was nerfed

[TheDude]

Originally posted by SBA77:

Originally posted by TheDude:

Recently I have been trying to enjoy each individual Chaos God's immortal Empire campaigns, partially after seeing Blake's talk about the mistakes people make with the Kairos campaign. But Khorne's campaigns just seem to be impossible to enjoy, the units like Bloodthirstier being incredibly weak compared to other monsters of their size, the total lack of income you can get out of any settlement, being almost constantly on the verge of debt while trying to maintain upkeep on an even basic army, being forced to fight every single battle or suffer from a terrible causality replenishment rate, never being able to occupy settlements in time for your less than 10% chance to recolonize a settlement to kick in. it feels like trying to balance on a glass floor, it isn't helped that diplomacy is impossible and that his starting position pits him against perhaps the only faction that Khorne units don't get a lot of value on with savage orcs having almost no Armour and all physical resistance, Plus the battle abilities do almost nothing in the early game, being a weaker version of a basic Waagh that only givers a little melee attack. The faction's abilities are all thematically correct and would feel awesome, but every part of the campaign feels like it is being held down after playing Valkia you get the exact opposite effect, snowballing through the dark elves and norscans near you and playing exactly like a khorne faction should. Why doesn't skarbrand feel the same?

I'm curious have you tried Valkia yet, and if so what do you think of her campaign?

Her game play style is fun, but she doesn't really get any mechanics of khorne other then a small bar at every army with some buffs, while her counterparts get way more interesting mechanics, it also doesn't help that i just don't find her that cool to watch on the battlefield compared to others, she just seems like a flying spear men, not the bride of khorne herself, she needs more specialized animation's. Part of me really wishes they had just made her a fully dedicated anti-magic character after reading more about her lore in relation to her summoning by the ever-chosen as it would have given her more personality.

[TheDude]

Originally posted by Darklordnj:

Originally posted by leandrombraz:

As Skarbrand, you can't just be on the verge of debt, you have to dive deep into debt and wear that red number like a badge. As long as you end the turn with enough gold to pay your debt, you're fine, and you can make enough gold just by sacking. Spawn as many Bloodhosts as you can, and don't be conservative with it just because of your economy. They are your economy.

KHorne is a big fan of the color red after all, more red the better.

I understand the debt being a part of his game play style, but it means i can only field an army of like 4 blood letters and some mortal followers as encampment recruiting is expensive and the upkeep only hikes up further while your not fighting, he really needs to just have a few turns before the bar starts hiking down, and a cheaper or better way of recruiting from encampment. Bloodhosts are cool and i enjoy them honestly the only redeemable way of fighting battles, having a mix of late game units helps your win early battles like nobody can I talked alot about the campaign but the biggest problem i think is how his economy contributes to every battle, while your enemies are fielding there cool and powerful units, you often are just surviving off of early game infantry scraps, even when you get to your late game units, they often aren't as powerful as they should be, for some reason the bloodthirsters are extremely weak in comparison to other large monster units, they are better used for harassing ranged infantry or attacking back lines with is the most anti-khorne thing i can think of skull cannons are pretty cool though, and i do enjoy his warshrine's and bloodshrine units despite there lackluster power I also think that the armies battle abilities just outright suck Horn of khorne provides a decent buff to melee attack which is good and the blade of khorne can absolutely kill a back line, but then you look at the other chaos gods and you see tzeentch smashing out more spells then ranged ammunition while throwing lightning bolts every couple of seconds, or nurgle healing his entire army thousands of hit points just for taking damage, even looking at just orcs get way more unit power from an easier to generate Waagh. instead it feels like discount spellcasting as units get buffs that a lore of magic could bring tenfold.

[Magni]

Originally posted by TheDude:

Originally posted by Darklordnj:

KHorne is a big fan of the color red after all, more red the better.

I understand the debt being a part of his game play style, but it means i can only field an army of like 4 blood letters and some mortal followers as encampment recruiting is expensive and the upkeep only hikes up further while your not fighting,

And there's your problem. Fight MORE! Beat up armies, sack more settlements, just rake in all that loot and stop caring about having a red number on your income figure.