Campaign tips for Elspeth?

[Grinch]

Between Skrag, Vlad, The Deceiver, Khazrak, Kemmler and Festus I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed and could use some guidance on where to focus when playing our resident goth milf.

[Meeshfast]

I went straight for Vlad and then Skrag and made friends with the dwarfs then moved north after that. Went well for me.

[Ashley]

Don't go north first. Focus on Vlad before he can level up high after The Changling his faction in ai hands is super useless. If Vlad doesn't level up high he won't get access to all his items.

Going north will put you closer to Chaos and going west of her position makes you closer to Kemmlar. Drycha is an easy kill after Vlad since she tends to take empire territory which is bad for growth bonuses. Bloody Hands will likely work their way up to you. Skrag? Never an issue for any of my campaigns. Ogres go nowhere. Will likely have to face Azhag AND bloody hands at the same time. After that campaign is really in your hands. Festus and Kharak aren't much of threats. Not enough Fortresses in the area.

[SpacePoon]

Elspeth is a top 3 easiest campaign in the game. OP mechanics, OP units, OP starting location. How could you possibly lose.

[Asdf]

Keep in mind that you no need military buildings aside one that req gunnery school. So you can went full eco. Trade with dwarfs, not WE.
As people said already kill Vlad first. Kill Drycha second. In this moment you can afford second army, and with 2 armies the rest is easy now.
Don't buy mortars, AI can easy dodge it. Engineer is very good, especially with hohland scopes trait that totally OP, you can roll and save character if you feel that need it. Jade wizard also must have. Witch hunter not so good but he have debuff that make more easy to kill a lord, and post-battle income with cleanse not so bad.

[cernodan]

Dude, if you are being overwhelmed with Elspeth, then honestly, you suffer from skill issue.
Nothing wrong with that, you just need to lower the difficulty and practice until you get the hang of it.
And, I wish I could give you advice, but to me it's like I'm being asked by someone on how to fight toddlers.
"Idk dude, it's a toddler, just flick it's nose or something, it's easy".

[Holy Fool Sehrael]

Agree on Vlad, he can be a massive pain in the ass if he's allowed to level up x) To make befriending dwarfs easier, you could capture a settlement that belongs to an enemy (A settlement that doesn't belong to the empire that is) and trade it to the dwarf faction in question. Most likely this will be enough to get trade, access, nonaggression or even more if you're so inclined. Aside from that get garrisons up ASAP as the Changeling probably has no qualms about sacking your settlements every other turn - might as well make it harder and less worthwhile for him.

On the other hand, befriending dwarfs will probably draw aggro from treehuggers, but I guess this is total war, so whatever.

[Scar Glamour]

Originally posted by Grinch:

Between Skrag, Vlad, The Deceiver, Khazrak, Kemmler and Festus I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed and could use some guidance on where to focus when playing our resident goth milf.

If you aren't playing on VH campaign, then it usually goes like this:
1. Capture Wissenland and Solland (including Fort Soll). Make sure that Black Mountains belong to Karak Hirn.
2. Build up until you can confed Talabecland/Averland and crush Vlad quickly. The trick is taking out his main army (just bring 2 armies, try to ambush, and autoresolve) and steamroll him before Vlad comes back.
3. After Vlad is gone, take Hochland, Brass Keep, and Ostland from Festus. Empire AI cannot handle him for some reason, but that just means more provinces for you.
4. Then you can mop up Drycha and take Ostenmark, leaving the western part of the Empire for Franz.

[Cenwalh]

Some general tips, as others have already written good advice on what the order of conquest should be:

- with the upgrades from Gunnery School, Pistoliers and Outriders are amaizng units; even more so against vampires, you can kite them forever; shoot, move, shoot, repeat until they’re dust. recruiting 5-10 of them works wonders
- when recruiting Engineer hero, look for the trait Hochland Scopes; might also want to make use of the Save Character feature to have em ready for future campaigns. make sure to place him in an army with lots of guns
- don’t be afraid to recruit another Lord from turn 1 to help your army. a priest of sigmar or engineer lord is much better than a bunch of crap units like T1 swordsmen or spears; Huntsman lord is excellent at sniping enemy lords and heroes
- the game suggests you build Gardens of Morr very early. dont rush it; it can have good benefits, but its expensive, and early on you need that $$ to build up your provinces
- in gunnery school i suggest you upgrade em in this order: Helstorm Rockets, Handgunners and then Missile Cav. these 3 should be your first
- i suggest researching the Farms one (forgot the exact name, the one that gives +growth) and immediately after go for the research that gives + % to schematics resource gain. you want to earn it as fast as possible
- tier 2 of the gunnery school - upgrade the missile cav to have ‘Restock’ ability. its OP.

[Vain Eldritch]

Just a note to this discussion - the Hochland Scopes trait has been removed form Engineers and is only available on Master Engineer Lords.