Picking an Army in Campaign?

[Daryl]

So im up to the point where i was at the Nexus.
Looking at the map

I have to choose

The Elves
The Refugees
The Orcs


Does that decide the army i will be playing with throughout the game?
And if so.
Whats the pros and cons of each army?

[gn_fighter]

not quite, you unlock these armys with the mission/storyline ( the human army consists of 3 missions/maps actually )

after you have unlocked two or three armys you can choose wich one you will take with you into the map in the same screen you choose your heros, except of course the missions where you recruit or upgrade an army.

as for the strenght and weaknesses well since you get to play each army in their recruitmen-mission you can get a picture of that yourself.

[Franky]

Humans: Balanced roster in that they combine weak and cheap basic units with great elites like paladin, best cavalry unit of the 3 races. Most vanilla race others are compared to so not much to comment. They apparently have the best defences once you hit t3 but im not at that stage of the game yet.
Eco wise are the easiest of the 3 races as they don't have any particular quirks.

Elves: Tend to focus on quality over quantity so their troops tend to be a little better (with some exceptions here and there like paladin being a better elite cavalry). The novice exemplifies this as she is better then either human or orc starter unit.
Their ranged units tend to outrange those of other races but do a little less dps.
Finally the real big thing is they need to upgrade an outpost to lvl2 before it can start spawning workers, and they got the option to turn an outpost into a turret (good for when your border outposts that you don't want to invest too much in yet or aint sure you can defend)

Orcs: Roster emphasizes melee and you start with the option of being able to recruit cavalry off the bat. This means you can hit the ground running with orcs compared to other races and they suit an aggressive expansion style because of that, since early on you will have the fastest army by default until enemy hits t2.
Despite having rather effective infantry though, their roster lacks range (as exemplified by their siege unit, the other 2 races get siege engines, orcs get a siege troll) so as you can imagine, chokepoints tend to work against them. Despite being able to deploy cavalry easier and cheaper then anyone else, their end game cavalry is mediocre so you'll be enjoying quantity versus the enemys quality there though i suppose that only encourages the orcs to raid since cavalry is disposable for them whereas for the other 2 races they are a significant investment.
Finally their structures tend to be innefective in that they have less worker slots compared to other races, which means you gotta building more buildings.

For my tastes i like to play defensive, so elves are a good fit for my playstyle.

[Daryl]

So 3 the choices to go with... Its just story and not main army pick yet?

[Whitehaven]

Certain campaign maps give you the option to choose between the 3. Most are preset though.(atleast from what i have seen so far)

[Daryl]

Originally posted by Whitehaven:

Certain campaign maps give you the option to choose between the 3. Most are preset though.(atleast from what i have seen so far)

which is more story rich
for the first pick
approach the elves that inspired you to break away?
approach the refugee woman and lead the humans?
go to the orcs and help shapeshifter with his problem and lead an army of orcs?

[Daryl]

Originally posted by Whitehaven:

Certain campaign maps give you the option to choose between the 3. Most are preset though.(atleast from what i have seen so far)

which is more story rich
for the first pick
approach the elves that inspired you to break away?
approach the refugee woman and lead the humans?
go to the orcs and help shapeshifter with his problem and lead an army of orcs?

[pmm5000]

The refugee woman took the longest to do quest wise, plus it gets you access to Everlight city. Which to me, means that you should do the Humans first, then proceed with the either the orcs or the elves. Orcs would probably be the best pick next considering you can get two companions from there. Whereas the elves...I have no idea why they are so irritating. Anyways, elves should in general be done last because they are apparently designed for late game power.

[Daryl]

Originally posted by pmm5000:

The refugee woman took the longest to do quest wise, plus it gets you access to Everlight city. Which to me, means that you should do the Humans first, then proceed with the either the orcs or the elves. Orcs would probably be the best pick next considering you can get two companions from there. Whereas the elves...I have no idea why they are so irritating. Anyways, elves should in general be done last because they are apparently designed for late game power.

In every lore. elves are unbarable.
Even Warhammer Fantasy.

[Daryl]

Originally posted by pmm5000:

The refugee woman took the longest to do quest wise, plus it gets you access to Everlight city. Which to me, means that you should do the Humans first, then proceed with the either the orcs or the elves. Orcs would probably be the best pick next considering you can get two companions from there. Whereas the elves...I have no idea why they are so irritating. Anyways, elves should in general be done last because they are apparently designed for late game power.

In every lore. elves are unbarable.
Even Warhammer Fantasy.

[pmm5000]

Don't get me wrong. I like the elves, just that I'm irritated that you can't get the architect for them unless you get their full power unlocked during their upgrade quest Corrupted Hearts. And even then, the ending for that line sucks unless you do another quest I think. I don't know yet. I haven't found the good ending.

[Daryl]

Originally posted by pmm5000:

Don't get me wrong. I like the elves, just that I'm irritated that you can't get the architect for them unless you get their full power unlocked during their upgrade quest Corrupted Hearts. And even then, the ending for that line sucks unless you do another quest I think. I don't know yet. I haven't found the good ending.

i will follow as ppl suggested to pick Humans first
but thus far I found 3 upgrade scrolls for Orc units xD