How do you play this game for hundreds of hours? Tips needed!

[Bolek_]

I myself am struggling with enjoying this game. I took the plunge in the most recent sale on Steam and bought TWW2, TWW1, Norsca, Tomb Kings, Vampire Coast, Prophet and the Warlock, and Hunter and the Beast for a grand total of $75. On paper, this game looks like my dream game, possibly the best game ever made. However, 24 hours in, I feel bored with it, which is sad. I should AT LEAST get 75 hours of gameplay, but I feel no desire to continue playing.

I would love to get at least 100 hours out of it, but like I said, the game feels boring (mainly the settlement/campaign map part--the real-time battles are cool).

The Vortex Campaign seems like it ends too fast, my armies are slow and can't traverse terrain enough to stop and enemy's ritual. Mortal Empires is intriguing only until I get a grade-A army, and then it feels pointless. I have played Vortex mode with Tyrion, and Mortal Empires with Tyrion. I've also messed around with Imriik and the Beast lizard guy (Nakhai?). I have heard that a player could get 50 hours out of a single campaign. Is that possible? Also, am I looking at this game the wrong way?

Since I have seen so many people having 500 to 1000+ hours on this game, could anyone give me some pointers on how to simply enjoy this game for many hours? I'm so bored with it after only 24 hours.

Please ask for clarification if I'm not making sense, and any help is greatly appreciated!!

[Ashantai]

I get it. There's some games which others obsess over I can't get into. Crusader Kings 2 is a great example of a game which I know is cool, but I just don't like playing it.

This? 1130 hours in I've got another 3 campaigns played.

Yet at the start I had a similar issue, and it was mainly the vortex. When ME came out I've played 24 of my 28 campaigns on that - and 3 of those 4 are just on the Vortex map using factions which don't do the race.

What I would home in on is to find a faction which really fits your style. Find something which speaks to you and just try it on normal/normal and see how you like them. Experiment, give yourself objectives, don't follow the scripted ones if you don't want.

[Skyrimosity]

It really helps to find a faction that you love; for example, I really enjoy playing a (modded) Teclis campaign and I've probably played about 100 hours just on his mortal empires campaign in separate playthroughs with different goals (I just make my own victory conditions). I've also played probably another 100 hours as Bretonnian factions (modded) and find them to be a ton of fon.

So, I'd suggest trying out some more Lords and races. You might be able to find a Lord that you click with or one with mechanics you enjoy working around. Tyrion is a great Lord but he is one of the more plain ones in terms of mechanics and gameplay. Nakai's is a campaign that I don't find very enjoyable.

Also, a mod like Closer to Tabletop would have unit caps that limits the amount of high-tier units you (and the AI) can have; that's one way of limiting doomstacks and keeping a more diverse army viable. Personally, I play with SFO [Grimhammer] which is a huge overhaul with optional unit caps but that's still being updated for the latest DLC.

[Kel'Thuzad]

Is there any particular aspect of the campaign map side of things you don't enjoy?

Replayability is generally what provides most people with 100's of hours of play. As far as TW games go, WH2 has more unique factions than any other TW game. So playing all of the different races is a fairly unique experience. Maybe you're just bored with Tyrion?
Tyrion is a pretty vanilla character (just a melee beast with no magic or anything) and has a fairly easy/boring starting location.

There's a lot of mods available in the workshop to tailor the game to your personal tastes. You can disable annoying enemy agents assassinating your characters, give your armies a bit of extra movement in home provinces, etc.

Find something about the game you like (a faction's playstyle, a character, a school of magic).
For me it's probably the spellcasting.. I love using high level casters to decimate enemy armies. It's something no other Total War game has ever had.
And there's so many different ways to enjoy that aspect of the game.
I can do a campaign as the archmage Teclis, then another as the Von Carsteins who wield the unique and powerful Vampire magic.. and so on.

[RoomTempiQ]

Pick a Faction that you think is cool and go play on Mortal Empires, maybe read or watch a video on said faction to get an idea on what kinda things you should focus on, basic army builds and economy, tech, ect.

Personally I like the Vampire Counts,Empire, Vampire Coast, Lizardmen, Tomb Kings and Skaven races.

Just tried my first run with the Orcs and they are pretty cool too.

I really like the City building aspect of the game, and of course the battles. If you only really dig the battle parts, then I'd suggest even more to look at what faction units stand out for you; who looks the coolest to play kinda thing.

You will need to learn how to manage your city's tho in order to have a successful campaign, that basically boils down to this.

Certain buldings are for what kind of units you want to build.
Others are for growth, wealth/income and trade for your lands.
Some of for Defence like walls and towers

Theres more to it than that but thats just a minimal summary of what buildings do for you.

[Drevux]

I'm having a blast so far, I picked up the game when it went on sale this weekend and have 26 hours on it already.

For me I've done two campaigns and I'm working on my third. The first campaign was Tyrion Vortex. This took me 16 hours to get to turn 97. Then I lost. I played it to the end and went down fighting.

I learned a lot and started a second campaign this time I tried Skavan. I was completely lost at what to do, I over played my starting army and ended up in a real dire situation after 90mins so I abandoned that campaign.

Now I'm about 8 hours in at turn 60 or so with Lord Mahzdamande of lizardmen, vortex again. Man am I having a blast. It started off okay then I fell way behind. I set a new objective to take this one town from these rat neighbors. My town was corrupted and I figured it was from them. It my mission to exterminate them before I lost the game.

With that focus I ended up taking their town but lost my starting tiwn in the process. Now I'm redoubling my efforts to rebuild my empire.

For me this is fantastic, the strategy in making these objectives then trying to figure out how to do it is awesome.

I'd recommend you experiment with various new races as others mentioned and then set specific small goals that line up to a bigger plan. Not sure if it will make it fun for you, but honestly I've not seen a game that has engaged me like this in over a decade.

[.]

I like to set limitations or handicaps. I also rarely finish games as I prefer early game over late.

[Bolek_]

Thank you guys for your advice and tips! What do you guys do in Mortal Empires? Doesn't it get boring around turn ~200? Also, how long is a typical Vortex campaign? I'm at ~140 turns with Tyrion.
The main thing I don't like about the campaign map is the conquering and alliance-building. Should I form huge alliances or take over the world?
Also, I hadn't necessarily thought about finding my type of faction. I'll look more into that.

[A.Pot]

A game like Total War is really not for everyone. I would have suggested that you just buy base game 1 (or 2), not buy the DLCs and just see if you even like it enough to buy the DLCs.

[Tanaka Khan]

For myself I was coming from a back ground of having played tabletop Warhammer, and also the early Total War games (Shogun, Medieval) so this just filled that slot perfectly for me. I've always been a fantasy junkie and just the idea of being able to control armies of Dawi is enjoyable to me.

The first thing in my opinion is finding that race that you like more than the others and play that one. Don't worry if you loose, because you will, just learn from your losses and you'll get better. I have over 2000 hours playing WH2 and I'm still learning tips and tricks.

[Kel'Thuzad]

Originally posted by boleswav27:

Thank you guys for your advice and tips! What do you guys do in Mortal Empires? Doesn't it get boring around turn ~200? Also, how long is a typical Vortex campaign? I'm at ~140 turns with Tyrion.
The main thing I don't like about the campaign map is the conquering and alliance-building. Should I form huge alliances or take over the world?
Also, I hadn't necessarily thought about finding my type of faction. I'll look more into that.

There's nothing wrong with starting a fresh campaign once you get bored or feel like victory is inevitable but will simply take a long time. It's actually a very small % of the playerbase who finish campaigns.
I usually get bored around turn 200 once I'm unstoppable and start a fresh campaign.

Alliances really come down to situational strategy. For example if you're in a location where you're surrounded and too weak to fight on multiple fronts, allying with one of your neighbours will make you safe from that direction and allow you to focus on dealing with other threats. You can always turn on your allies later when you're much more powerful.
The other main reason for alliances is to confederate factions of the same race. E.g. Tyrion can confederate Teclis, Alariel, Alith Anar.
Trading with friendly factions can also be a massive chunk of your campaign income.

The lands of your allies typically count towards your campaign victory conditions. So it's an alternate means of achieving victory without being an utter warmongering conqueror.
It's really up to you whether you prefer to make war or friends. It will also depend on the faction you're playing (Chaos, Beastmen and Orcs are geared towards warmongering, as they can't trade, and can't as easily make alliances as they're hated by almost everyone).

[Ben Argo]

Try twenty turns as each faction to see what you're leaning towards. Then go hard in that one faction.

If you're a perfectionist, learn to play th perfect first ten turns for each faction. Or at least the ones you like.

Up the difficulty if you find the battles or campaign map aren't challenging enough.

[TheSwampyBogard]

Apart from what others have said, if you really cant enjoy campaign but like the battles, just play MP.

Much more battling, generally more challenging and unpredictable considering your playing against people.

[Lain]

i havent gotten bored in 1300 hours cause every campaign after about 100-200 hours i play is modded, and i play different ways every time, i rarely think about the actual victory conditions

tbh if your bored after 70 hours then its not really a dream game.

[Yellowdragon]

It's fine to be bored maybe this is not your type of game.

I got bored in Heart of Iron and Europa Universalise after 30 mins. And they got a very positive score and good reviews.

If you want to enjoy it more then use mods to suit your play style or play in higher difficulty.

[Step Sis Proof Appliances]

Take a break and play something else for awhile and come back and it will feel fresh. Also play on higher difficulties. Makes it a lot more enjoyable.