Most important stat for holding the line as the empire?

[PuttBlug]

Spearmen with shields are crap even with red line buffs and lots of experience, I want something to hold the line that's not warrior priests or captains because it feels extremely gamey.

I don't care for my melee infantry to inflict damage, just to last as long as possible against stronger enemies while my missile infantry and artillery can finish them off. Are greatswords just better? 70 more armor, more health, more morale, wouldn't they perform better in that regard (standing their ground) even against large opponents?

[Raider Deci]

Armor & melee defence. But as the empire your best bet is still just to spam out halberdiers since they are fairly cheap & can after some techs be recruited in 1 turn through global recruitment. They will still die in droves but there isnt much else to choose from.

I also personally prefer light wizards by far as the empire simply because of net of amyntok, to hold unit or units in place just for a little while so guns can do their work.

[PuttBlug]

Originally posted by Raider Deci:

Armor & melee defence. But as the empire your best bet is still just to spam out halberdiers since they are fairly cheap & can after some techs be recruited in 1 turn through global recruitment. They will still die in droves but there isnt much else to choose from.

I also personally prefer light wizards by far as the empire simply because of net of amyntok, to hold unit or units in place just for a little while so guns can do their work.

Halbediers have 10 or 15 more defence than greatswords but 70 less armor and less HP, I'm not sure what would be better.

Also I'm struggling to fight against hordes of chaff from the vampire counts, they just overwhelm me before I can do anything with my artillery and missile troops. I still kill way more than they do but end up losing unless I auto resolve. I was using spearmen with shields by the way because someone said they're the best simply for having the best defense along with halbediers but also shields. Obviously halbediers would barely fare better than spearmen and break more or less as fast as they did.

That's why I'm asking if greatswords are better for line holding than those two.

[Eldrin]

Originally posted by Chilly Chili:

Originally posted by Raider Deci:

Armor & melee defence. But as the empire your best bet is still just to spam out halberdiers since they are fairly cheap & can after some techs be recruited in 1 turn through global recruitment. They will still die in droves but there isnt much else to choose from.

I also personally prefer light wizards by far as the empire simply because of net of amyntok, to hold unit or units in place just for a little while so guns can do their work.

Halbediers have 10 or 15 more defence than greatswords but 70 less armor and less HP, I'm not sure what would be better.

Also I'm struggling to fight against hordes of chaff from the vampire counts, they just overwhelm me before I can do anything with my artillery and missile troops. I still kill way more than they do but end up losing unless I auto resolve. I was using spearmen with shields by the way because someone said they're the best simply for having the best defense along with halbediers but also shields. Obviously halbediers would barely fare better than spearmen and break more or less as fast as they did.

That's why I'm asking if greatswords are better for line holding than those two.

Greatswords are generally considered one of the worst units of empire because of their cost and what they actually do on the battlefield.

If you are making so much money that you do not know what to do with, yea sure go for them. But if not get spearmen with shields and expensive artillery, cavalry, missiles. The spearmen are there to hold the line and die while the rest destroy the enemy.

Empires infantry IS their BIGGEST weakness.

[PuttBlug]

Yeah I can get greatswords at least for my main army (playing on normal campaign difficulty) so if armor is in fact better than melee defense for line holding then I'll go for them. I too hope that the empire gets better infantry in the future.

Does anybody know if they have better infantry options than what we already have? What could be added in the upcoming DLC?

[Zeek]

Spearmen with shields is the best line holder the empire has unfortunately. This is while considering cost, stats, and performance.

They won't do damage and they will die, but that's OK. They exist soley to protect your ranged units which are the real damage dealers.

[Aleera]

The general rule is.

Armour is the stat you want vs low AP enemies. It will flatout always mitigate damage.
While facing high AP damage, you want Melee defense.

Heck there can be something said about Flagellants. They will hold the line till the last model, being unbreakable.

If you're talking about singleplayer. The best hold the line unit the Empire has is the Eldred's Guard. They have base 70 armour, 60% missile block chance and base 42 melee defense, expert charge defense AND charge reflection. Not to mention, have a +8 leadership aura which 2 Eldred's Guard will give to eachother.

But 1 thing you have to realize, having your frontline actually deal damage back helps more to holding the line then you'd realize. A dead enemy model is a model that doesn't need to be held back.

For example, Eldred's Guard vs Chaos warriors with greatweapons will quite sadly die quickly. Yet Greatswords will not break rank and actually defeat these Chaos warriors most of the time. Because for the effect of "losing current engagement and hp loss" the greatswords will lose leadership far less quicker then the Eldred's Guard.

But a actual unit to hold the line, like say Ironbreakers, the Empire simply does not have currently.

[mooreshawnm]

If the kept everything the same but increased the number of models in the spears and halb by 50% it would go a long way.

[Raider Deci]

Originally posted by Chilly Chili:

Also I'm struggling to fight against hordes of chaff from the vampire counts, .

I will still say halberdiers as a main line, but some greatswords can good to have against vampires-chaff for sure (or any with lots of cheap chaff). The huntsmarshal-lord can buff those a little bit extra too. But they are expensive for what they really provide.

[Basarab Laiota]

melee defence and Leadership (no, not Leadership Aura Size)
but why not just hold the line with the empire's melee heroes instead?

[cernodan]

If you don't wish to use heroes or say, Steam Tanks, then your best bet would be Halberdiers.
That is because they have the best Red Line buffs and the best Tech Tree buffs (i.e charge defense against all). Add some passive auras from Lords & Heroes and AoE buffs from wizards and you should have a pretty decent anvil.
Note that they will absolutely melt against missiles and can't hold the line as long as the more specialized units of other races.

[Eldrin]

Originally posted by Chilly Chili:

Yeah I can get greatswords at least for my main army (playing on normal campaign difficulty) so if armor is in fact better than melee defense for line holding then I'll go for them. I too hope that the empire gets better infantry in the future.

Does anybody know if they have better infantry options than what we already have? What could be added in the upcoming DLC?

Generally melee defense is better as once armor piercing comes into play that armor is reduced to almost nothing. They also lack shields that the spearmen have that reduce ranged damage by a huge amount.

For actual better infantry ally the dwarves and get their stuff. Ever their basic dwarf warriors are superior.

[PuttBlug]

Originally posted by Basarab Laiota:

melee defence and Leadership (no, not Leadership Aura Size)
but why not just hold the line with the empire's melee heroes instead?

I like to make my empire armies a bit more believable, otherwise a life wizard and full steam tank doomstack would obliterate almost everything with ease more than a frontline of heroes and missile units behind.

From what I gather everyone agrees that, cost factor aside, greatswords are better for a front line than halbediers or spearmen with shields.

Originally posted by Mu:

What they could for DLC is to lower the requirements/upkeep for Greatswords, maybe also lower its stats a little.

Introduce Foot Reiksguard that would require the current buildings for Greatswords, it would be a well-rounded sword and shield unit with no armour-piercing but bonus vs infantry.

And above that maybe Teutogen Guards, these would act like Hammerers for Dwarfs basically with more emphasis on dealing damage than defending (no shields, has frenzy, armour-piercing, bonus if in proximity of a lord/hero and so on...).

That would be great, a heavy infantry unit with lots of armor, lots of melee defense and perhaps shields. Their weapon damage can be trash I don't mind.

[DanCan]

Its fine to not want to use heroes as your pure frontline, but choosing not to use Warrior Priest's at all seems counter-intuitive. Empire is Faith, Steel and Gunpowder, and losing out on 25s of 20% Ward Save for units near the WP every 90s is such a massive loss, not to mention the 25s of +24 MA every 60s. Outside of that, your option is to have your magic mirco be consistent with overcasting buff spells to keep your units in the fight such as overcasted Pha's protection from light wizards (10WOM, 22s dur, 29s CD). If done right, for only 10winds of magic, a lvl 11 WP (or a lvl 8 Arch-lector to also have your lvl 3 redline, otherwise lvl 4 lord for redline), and a lvl 5 light wizard, you should be able to reliably buff 3 shielded spear units to reach 60 armor, 72md, 51 ma with 20% ward for 22seconds, and if 20% ward 72md cant hold a frontline long enough for artillery or missiles to do the job, nothing will and you need to change how you're applying your hammer to the anvil.

But as for the actual question posed regarding what stat is preferred? MD, since AP damage is all too common.

[DanCan]

Originally posted by Mu:

Speaking of heroes, Empire Captain could use a couple buff-to-infantry or other utility skills, as it stands Warrior Priests are far more useful.

Agreed, i've pretty much abandoned them entirely in my armies because they only have one useful active ability and do not get access to a monstrous mount. They really should get access to a set of army doctrines, which would either be passive buffs applied to ONE unit type and lock out the other types with a limit so that more captains couldnt buff the same unit type, or perhaps big cd army-wide (or larger than 35m radii) buffs in a similar fashion to the WP.

[PuttBlug]

Originally posted by DanCan:

Its fine to not want to use heroes as your pure frontline, but choosing not to use Warrior Priest's at all seems counter-intuitive. Empire is Faith, Steel and Gunpowder, and losing out on 25s of 20% Ward Save for units near the WP every 90s is such a massive loss, not to mention the 25s of +24 MA every 60s. Outside of that, your option is to have your magic mirco be consistent with overcasting buff spells to keep your units in the fight such as overcasted Pha's protection from light wizards (10WOM, 22s dur, 29s CD). If done right, for only 10winds of magic, a lvl 11 WP (or a lvl 8 Arch-lector to also have your lvl 3 redline, otherwise lvl 4 lord for redline), and a lvl 5 light wizard, you should be able to reliably buff 3 shielded spear units to reach 60 armor, 72md, 51 ma with 20% ward for 22seconds, and if 20% ward 72md cant hold a frontline long enough for artillery or missiles to do the job, nothing will and you need to change how you're applying your hammer to the anvil.

But as for the actual question posed regarding what stat is preferred? MD, since AP damage is all too common.

I do have one warrior priest per army to buff the frontline and tank some damage too. The heroes I don't use at all for armies are captains and witch hunters.