Advice for Nakai?

[Will Report Flying Cars]

I made a similar thread for Snikch and it went really well. I played that campaign for 250 turns.

I am still new to this game, I played about 70 turns of Nakai today and I have a few questions.

1) How do I make money? I'm permanently in the red. I can't raid? Or raze or sack settlements?

2) Is Nakai supposed to have such bad regen and mobility? Seems like I can barely move anywhere so I can't catch enemy armies. And if I am in enemy territory if I encamp I get like maybe 5% regen.

If I'm gonna have just 1 horde army surely at least that army should be overpowered?

3) How can I tell when my settlement is being attacked? One got raided and I didn't even know.

4) Every lizardmen is allying with me, without me even trying. I feel like I am supposed to do something with this, but what?

Other than that, I like him a lot in combat. He runs through infantry like nothing. It's a little boring just having melee and skinks as ranged every fight is basically just run at the enemy and fight to the death.

At least Chain Lightning is awesome.

Thx

[Багряный]

You need to quickly gather an army of Kroxigor and build a building to reduce maintenance. Build temples and perform a ritual that gives a bonus to tribute from your vassal. Over time, you will receive a lot of passive income from them. Research technologies for regeneration and the growth rate of the horde. Nakai is very easy to play.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2420000380

[McSpanky]

For the true nakai experience get any and all Kroxigor buffs as soon as possible. I was able to hold off 3 seperate armies attacking me with just Nakai, some skinks, and a load of kroxigors.

[Fryskar]

Imo nakai got the worst economy ingame.
You're a horde that can't raid/sack for huge money gains. You can use your ritual so your vassal gives you a bit more or straight demand money from him. But thats still not much.

[Jeslis]

You don't actually have any towns. You have a vassal.

Your income is a function of the vassals income.. I believe its 25%? (I could be wrong).. so if you see a vassal town makes 400gold, that means you get 100 gold from it.

A KEY point is, the vassal doesn't have any expenditures, it just keeps the gold. What this means is, you can go into the diplomacy screen and demand payments from your vassal. It's not alot, but it can help.

Regen wise; everyone's regen is kinda ♥♥♥♥ outside their perfect environment. Invest in regen (blue line) skills first. It's been awhile since I've played Nakai specifically, but in MOST cases you want to invest blue line lord skills first for lightning strike, upkeep reduction, and then regen & +ambush chance if you use it... as well as the final blue line skill which is further upkeep reduction, +recruitment rank, and +movement in most lords cases.

Notes for lizardmen autoresolve; Kroxigar and the 10units per unitcard 'orange' pterodactyls do really well. You want as many of them as you can afford +as many 'melee soaks' (cheap saurus up to Temple Guard I think they are called) as you can afford.

Good luck!

[Jeslis]

To be clear and answer some of your more specific questions:

1) How do I make money? I'm permanently in the red. I can't raid? Or raze or sack settlements? -- Combat, Diplomacy demanding payments from your vassal thing that manages the towns, and investing into Upkeep reduction structures and skills AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE

2) Is Nakai supposed to have such bad regen and mobility? Seems like I can barely move anywhere so I can't catch enemy armies. And if I am in enemy territory if I encamp I get like maybe 5% regen. --- Regen % is very misleading.. +5% in a talent can translate to +250% of your current regen value... eg; if you regen 5 out of 100 unit stack per turn, and get a +5% regen talent.. you might suddenly regen 25 out of 100 unit stack per turn. Its VERY misleading. Small amounts MEAN ALOT.

If I'm gonna have just 1 horde army surely at least that army should be overpowered? It will be, it just takes a bit.

3) How can I tell when my settlement is being attacked? One got raided and I didn't even know. - They aren't your settlements. This will happen. There isn't a ton you can do. (I believe there is a rite or something that allows you to have the vassal summon an army... it's supposed to help defend its stuff but its kinda braindead.) .. In most cases I had to VERY carefully plan my norsca path to not allow lords to get around me, and even then I had to backtrack to clear up leakers.

4) Every lizardmen is allying with me, without me even trying. I feel like I am supposed to do something with this, but what? So... Diplomacy in TWWH2 is not very well done. In most cases you don't want any Defensive or Military Allies, as they will drag you (and more importantly as Nakai, your vassal) into wars you DO NOT WANT. Do not accept alliances unless you want to drag an AI into a war that it might otherwise help with. Otherwise there is no point.

-----------------------

A final note;
Nakai is a long haul game. Its a slow buildup. If you are a person who needs faster gratification, Nakai is not the lord for you.

[Will Report Flying Cars]

Thanks guys I started over using this advice given here and it was OK for about 50 turns then I started struggling but then by turn 90 I started steamrolling.

Like literally I just plowed through town after town.

Until turn 135 then I beat the entire game and had full temples

It almost became mundane

[Jeslis]

Originally posted by Will Report Flying Cars:

Thanks guys I started over using this advice given here and it was OK for about 50 turns then I started struggling but then by turn 90 I started steamrolling.

Like literally I just plowed through town after town.

Until turn 135 then I beat the entire game and had full temples

It almost became mundane

I too decided to try a nakai campaign because of your post here as it had been a bit since I've played him.

I definitely dislike the fact that Rakarath starts right there.. and I ended up just leaving him there but prevented him from having the full province for awhile....

Due to the dark elves being world dominating my last game, decided to do something about it this time.. and it definitely took a bit of time being SUPER careful and just taking random port cities and coastals..

But once my research and upkeep reduction structures got where they needed to be, the steamroll begins! :)

It's definitely a slow start lord.

FYI: If you ever play Wood Elves (the original ones/area at least), they are kinda in a similar boat. Slow start.

[Konstantin]

From my memories Nakai is, build army of Kroxigors near to enemy. Stay in stance that reduce upkeep and be slightly in red with it. Then move to enemy to attack where you will have grave losses and great income. Combine any surviverunits upgrade your Monolith and then repeat.

[Orums]

So I've been dumping crazy hours into Nakai and his campaign sucks absolute testes...if you don't play into his strengths:

-when not actively turning armies into food, disband all but your heroes, 2 krox and a saurus unit. if you get caught with your pants down they can provide cover for your retreat.

-invest in horde growth and recruitment capacity and at least one pip in reduced recruitment post Albion. if you're aggressive you can auto-resolve Rakarth away on normal if he's already fought the Norscans.

-if you're going full kroxibro, devote all three to Itzl and recruit a skink priest via the temple of the old ones, he's going to save you from wasting skill points in replenishment. he can also function as amazing support for nakai since he struggles with single entity targets. Even better on a terradon

-every 2-3 turns, demand your vassal pay you for the territory you're about to earn them. especially while you're in the middle of a war because an extra 2300 gold is essentially enough krox to tackle anything

-the crappy movement is actually a strongsuit because he's all about seeing one turn ahead via heroes or Astromancy; unless you're safe from attrition you'll rarely use astromancy. it let's you set up ambushes and being able to encamp every turn is great if you mess up and get attacked before you're ready

-Terradons

-once you know that next turn is going to be a battle, you raise up a buncha kroxigors nice and cheap and go to town raising temples like nobodies business.

-Treat nakai like cavalry in battle, but on foot, after a while his speed matches most cav anyway and his charge attack CAN BE CHAINED BETWEEN UNITS. just gotta get him into a good groove and you'll honestly not even need magic

-still use magic, heavens is okish for thinning crowds, but beasts pushes these guys over the absolute edge

-each battle should see you merging units, disbanding low HP ones, and recruiting replacements as needed so long as it's safe. This is the horde vibe because typical factions take two turns to recruit 2-4 units in the early game. Nakai can take one turn to raise four.

-Faction destroyed? no hostiles in the area? do some upgrades and plan your next move. Once you've upgraded plot a course to your next objective. Travelling light means more money, travelling to specific objective points takes turns. turns mean money and growth.

-hold up! see that settlement over there? yeah the one you're sailing past belonging to a faction that couldn't hope to stand up to nakai and the gang? go steal its technology before we roll out on the next turn

rinse and repeat until you realize that you've got a freaking mountain of gold and only one army that's kinda lonely. playing like this has made his campaign go from being a boring slog to actually being kinda fun. Yeah his skill tree sucks cookies and arrows tend to be a problem but I kinda feel like I'm getting my money's worth when I give him poison, magical, discouraging attacks while causing fear. he not only breaks bones, but souls...and nervous systems. I hope this helps, Nakai is indeed a wanderer who basically just gets in fights wherever he goes. his growth is slow because he's not meant to go long without conflict giving him an excuse to gain more growth from a settlement. As a LL he's definitely Tier C from his sheer combat ability and his ability to gather a lot of bros really quickly. I hope this helps someone actually have ffun with him because watching that scaly bastard work is an absolute treat once he's good and roided out.

[Will Report Flying Cars]

Originally posted by Orums:

So I've been dumping crazy hours into Nakai and his campaign sucks absolute testes...if you don't play into his strengths:

-when not actively turning armies into food, disband all but your heroes, 2 krox and a saurus unit. if you get caught with your pants down they can provide cover for your retreat.

-invest in horde growth and recruitment capacity and at least one pip in reduced recruitment post Albion. if you're aggressive you can auto-resolve Rakarth away on normal if he's already fought the Norscans.

-if you're going full kroxibro, devote all three to Itzl and recruit a skink priest via the temple of the old ones, he's going to save you from wasting skill points in replenishment. he can also function as amazing support for nakai since he struggles with single entity targets. Even better on a terradon

-every 2-3 turns, demand your vassal pay you for the territory you're about to earn them. especially while you're in the middle of a war because an extra 2300 gold is essentially enough krox to tackle anything

-the crappy movement is actually a strongsuit because he's all about seeing one turn ahead via heroes or Astromancy; unless you're safe from attrition you'll rarely use astromancy. it let's you set up ambushes and being able to encamp every turn is great if you mess up and get attacked before you're ready

-Terradons

-once you know that next turn is going to be a battle, you raise up a buncha kroxigors nice and cheap and go to town raising temples like nobodies business.

-Treat nakai like cavalry in battle, but on foot, after a while his speed matches most cav anyway and his charge attack CAN BE CHAINED BETWEEN UNITS. just gotta get him into a good groove and you'll honestly not even need magic

-still use magic, heavens is okish for thinning crowds, but beasts pushes these guys over the absolute edge

-each battle should see you merging units, disbanding low HP ones, and recruiting replacements as needed so long as it's safe. This is the horde vibe because typical factions take two turns to recruit 2-4 units in the early game. Nakai can take one turn to raise four.

-Faction destroyed? no hostiles in the area? do some upgrades and plan your next move. Once you've upgraded plot a course to your next objective. Travelling light means more money, travelling to specific objective points takes turns. turns mean money and growth.

-hold up! see that settlement over there? yeah the one you're sailing past belonging to a faction that couldn't hope to stand up to nakai and the gang? go steal its technology before we roll out on the next turn

rinse and repeat until you realize that you've got a freaking mountain of gold and only one army that's kinda lonely. playing like this has made his campaign go from being a boring slog to actually being kinda fun. Yeah his skill tree sucks cookies and arrows tend to be a problem but I kinda feel like I'm getting my money's worth when I give him poison, magical, discouraging attacks while causing fear. he not only breaks bones, but souls...and nervous systems. I hope this helps, Nakai is indeed a wanderer who basically just gets in fights wherever he goes. his growth is slow because he's not meant to go long without conflict giving him an excuse to gain more growth from a settlement. As a LL he's definitely Tier C from his sheer combat ability and his ability to gather a lot of bros really quickly. I hope this helps someone actually have ffun with him because watching that scaly bastard work is an absolute treat once he's good and roided out.

Thanks for that

[Twisted Traveller]

"Nakai's campaign is the biggest load of Abandonware CA ever put out" -LegendofTotalWar

He's basically right. The entire campaign is not fun and is basically nay-on impossible. Your Vassal which is your source of income won't do anything the whole game, early game is easy but once you hit turn 50-70 that all changes as you'll be restricted to maybe 1 army, your vassal will only have 1 army MAX due to them never fielding armies and your opponents will have many armies which'll happily hunt you down forever with units they can support, you're forced to use ♥♥♥♥ because of upkeep. I believe I keep trying to do it on EoV but end up giving up plenty of times due to how boring, nightmarish and unfair it is a whole. If your vassal actually did something past sit around giving you pittance this would be fair, if occupying places with resources meant something (Which it doesnt) then it would also be nice.