Which race-faction has strongest-most expensive units

[Wild_Nipples]

I like to play for race-faction that has strong and expensive units (protoss in starcraft, Rome in ancient strategy games).
Which race-faction would you recommend me to play?

[chronobomb]

If you watch LegenddTotalWarr Rate my Doomstack you can see which are the most powerrful against 4 enemy armies

[brownacs]

Origineel geplaatst door chronobomb:

TK can get their buildings for free with tech and bonuses

... sorry, explain? You can get free buildings with the TKs?

[Quillithe]

Origineel geplaatst door Xaphnir:

Origineel geplaatst door Quillithe:

Obviously a bit silly, but I'm not sure about Shades (maybe with the right lord skills I guess)
Dread Saurians move faster, poison once they get into their ranged attack range (which is barely shorter than shades), do decent ranged damage (something like 1/4 of shades though), have over twice the health, and just smash them once you get in melee.

You're making the mistake of looking too much at stats.

In practice, Dread Saurians go down extremely fast to missile fire, especially armor-piercing missile fire. 10 units of Shades will take down a Dread Saurian in a single volley. In a 19 Shades vs. 19 Dread Saurians battle I'd guess 4-6 Dread Saurians will die before they even make melee contact (depending on the buffs the Shades are receiving from tech, their lord, and their experience level). And with that many losses I doubt Dread Saurians will kill the Shades fast enough that the ones that aren't caught in melee won't shred them. At the very least, the Shades will vastly outperform their cost in the battle.

I also suspect a Shaggoth stack might be able to beat a Dread Saurian stack due to the size difference. The Shaggoth's smaller size would mean more Shaggoths are attacking at any given point than Dread Saurians, giving Shaggoths higher damage output. Not sure if that'd be enough to overcome the Dread Saurians having twice as much health, though. And the poison might also make the difference. Ghorgons would probably fare similarly, as they're very similar to Shaggoths.

Also Dread Saurians wouldn't be able to do much of anything against missile cavalry, though they'd probably have enough health and missile cavalry tend to have lower ammo, so they'd probably just tank the damage and win the battle, albeit with heavy losses.

And they might also struggle against a Wurrzag Rogue Idol army due to the amount of physical resistance on them.

And Arachnarok Spiders might be able to win, too. They can already almost beat Dread Saurians 1v1, and with their slightly smaller size the advantage would probably go to them.

Just tried it, Shades get absolutely stomped, maybe get 5 kills total.
Waywatchers I can see the argument, but Shades? They don't 360 fire and they barely outrange Saurians. Maybe you get two volleys and kill 4 but you then immediately rout in melee as they murder 15 of your units. Maybe with campaign and lord buffs they'd do better, but that's just because not much buffs Saurians. And yeah, obviously cost efficient but basically any ranged is against Saurians anyway.

Similarly they also trash Spiders without campaign buffs, didn't check Shaggoths or Rogue idols

Missile cav could be a pain, though AI missile cav would probably let you shoot them to death anyway, Saurian ranged dps actually isn't that bad (well, it is for their cost).

They're a pretty trash doomstack though, besides being impossible to make sieges would be a nightmare.

Anyway, it's a good argument for Lizardmen being an elite unit faction, certainly isn't much that can take a Dread Saurian 1v1.

[Xaphnir]

Origineel geplaatst door Quillithe:

Just tried it, Shades get absolutely stomped, maybe get 5 kills total.
Waywatchers I can see the argument, but Shades? They don't 360 fire and they barely outrange Saurians. Maybe with campaign and lord buffs they'd do better, but that's just because not much buffs Saurians. And yeah, obviously cost efficient but basically any ranged is against Saurians anyway.

Well, the post that first posited that was talking about having them in an army with a Shadowdart lord, and with tech and red line buffs as well that puts them up nearly 240 range. Normally I think Shadowdart is kind of mediocre due to their low accuracy at that range, but against a target as big as a Dread Saurian that wouldn't be much of an issue.

As for Arachnaroks vs Dread Saurians, really? I've had them fight 1v1 in custom battles before, and it's very close. How are you having them fight? Just take two lines stretched out and run them into each other? Because that's going to nullify the advantage of smaller size that Arachnaroks would have if that's what you're doing.

[Quillithe]

Origineel geplaatst door Xaphnir:

Origineel geplaatst door Quillithe:

Just tried it, Shades get absolutely stomped, maybe get 5 kills total.
Waywatchers I can see the argument, but Shades? They don't 360 fire and they barely outrange Saurians. Maybe with campaign and lord buffs they'd do better, but that's just because not much buffs Saurians. And yeah, obviously cost efficient but basically any ranged is against Saurians anyway.

Well, the post that first posited that was talking about having them in an army with a Shadowdart lord, and with tech and red line buffs as well that puts them up nearly 240 range. Normally I think Shadowdart is kind of mediocre due to their low accuracy at that range, but against a target as big as a Dread Saurian that wouldn't be much of an issue.

As for Arachnaroks vs Dread Saurians, really? I've had them fight 1v1 in custom battles before, and it's very close. How are you having them fight? Just take two lines stretched out and run them into each other? Because that's going to nullify the advantage of smaller size that Arachnaroks would have if that's what you're doing.

Yeah, I said maybe with lord buffs, I haven't played dark elves enough to know exactly what they do. I was just bringing it up in terms of "faction with elite units" and 19 star dragons - I'll admit I overstated it a little since they absolutely die to waywatchers if nothing else.

I did just try a line as a quick test, but in a 1v1 test the Arachnarok did only about 1/4 the health of the Saurian before losing half its health and running - generally their bad morale means they don't seem to stay around long. It could certainly depend though, 19 saurians have a bad habit of friendly fire if they aren't careful.

Little off topic here, but 19 waywatchers is a fairly funny elite doomstack, on defense against most armies you can just set them to skirmish and walk away and they'll beat the AI.

[Crowkeeper]

Origineel geplaatst door chronobomb:

It's a fun battle to play.

Except it's not. lmao Super lame and boring is what I would call it.

[chronobomb]

Origineel geplaatst door brownacs:

Origineel geplaatst door chronobomb:

TK can get their buildings for free with tech and bonuses

... sorry, explain? You can get free buildings with the TKs?

You get followers that can completely eliminate the cost of buildings.
-Charnel Valley Necrotect follower
-Skeletal Laborers
-Necrotect Heroes get a -10% cost

[Slap Happy Pappy]

Origineel geplaatst door chronobomb:

Origineel geplaatst door brownacs:

... sorry, explain? You can get free buildings with the TKs?

You get followers that can completely eliminate the cost of buildings.
-Charnel Valley Necrotect follower
-Skeletal Laborers

He isn't wrong, but by the time this comes on line it becomes a moot point.

[funkmonster7]

Origineel geplaatst door Quillithe:

Origineel geplaatst door Xaphnir:

Well, the post that first posited that was talking about having them in an army with a Shadowdart lord, and with tech and red line buffs as well that puts them up nearly 240 range. Normally I think Shadowdart is kind of mediocre due to their low accuracy at that range, but against a target as big as a Dread Saurian that wouldn't be much of an issue.

As for Arachnaroks vs Dread Saurians, really? I've had them fight 1v1 in custom battles before, and it's very close. How are you having them fight? Just take two lines stretched out and run them into each other? Because that's going to nullify the advantage of smaller size that Arachnaroks would have if that's what you're doing.

Yeah, I said maybe with lord buffs, I haven't played dark elves enough to know exactly what they do. I was just bringing it up in terms of "faction with elite units" and 19 star dragons - I'll admit I overstated it a little since they absolutely die to waywatchers if nothing else.

I did just try a line as a quick test, but in a 1v1 test the Arachnarok did only about 1/4 the health of the Saurian before losing half its health and running - generally their bad morale means they don't seem to stay around long. It could certainly depend though, 19 saurians have a bad habit of friendly fire if they aren't careful.

Little off topic here, but 19 waywatchers is a fairly funny elite doomstack, on defense against most armies you can just set them to skirmish and walk away and they'll beat the AI.

19 Shades with Shadowdart (or Barbstorm) lord will beat 19 Dread Saurians doomstack. But you can't just sit the Shades down and shoot them, or put them on Skirmish mode and expect them to work like Waywatchers. Shades can counter monster armies but you need to micro, play it like chess. Throw away a pawn as fodder while the rest keep shooting. Abuse Stalk and run away while the fodder gets routed, etc.

If you just test this in a normal battle test, the results will be wrong because vanilla Shades without any lord buffs do the same damage as Darkshards. But campaign Shades do a hell lot more damage than Darkshards, at the expense of less ammo than fully buffed Darkshards.

If you don't use Stalk to your advantage when slaying Dread Saurians, you may as well be using Darkshards, period. Even the melee-oriented Shades have never been meant for killing monsters in melee, they are first and foremost anti-infantry. Missiles just happen to be anti-everything in this game which makes them somewhat viable against Dread Saurians.

Anyway I/we digress. Back to OP's question; play Lizardmen or High Elves. But as High Elves are easy to cheese with cheap missile units - stick to Lizardmen.

[Edit] In a Shades army, use your lord on mount as bait. Set out 2 groups of Shades, one for initial engagement, the other for flank shooting. When the first group disengages and tries to go back into Stalk, the other group takes over and becomes the main engagement. Rinse and repeat. Use the lord as the bait if you want neither Shades groups engaging i.e. both are retreating back into Stalk. For this purpose, I like using the ranged Dreadlord better than the shielded female one. But usually I go with a Supreme Sorceress because magic is better than a one-handed crossbow.

Also, 19 Dread Saurians micro'ed by a player will also win against 19 Shades micro'ed by AI. It's pretty easy too, you just send 1 Dread Saurian to chase after 1 Shades unit, AI can't really counter that other than focus fire but AI rarely ever sends 19 Shades to shoot out a single monster at a time. But pitting 19 Dread Saurians against 19 Shades is quite unfair, the cost can't even be compared. If we balance out the costs and send 19 Dread Saurians against about 38 Shades, you will be the one trying to micro Dread Saurians just to make sure they don't get insta-gibbed, as even AI Shades will slaughter you.

I mean, it's kinda a no-brainer that 19 Dread Saurians will krump 19 Shades in a head-on fight, I mean c'mon...

[Quillithe]

Origineel geplaatst door funkmonster7:

19 Shades with Shadowdart (or Barbstorm) lord will beat 19 Dread Saurians doomstack. But you can't just sit the Shades down and shoot them, or put them on Skirmish mode and expect them to work like Waywatchers. Shades can counter monster armies but you need to micro, play it like chess. Throw away a pawn as fodder while the rest keep shooting. Abuse Stalk and run away while the fodder gets routed, etc.

Fair enough - certainly against an AI saurian stack this would crush them because they'd also send more than 1 Saurian at the fodder. A player might make this more difficult by spreading his saurians out enough that you can't really flank them, but I can still believe the shades could win with campaign bonuses.

EDIT: Yeah, I know it isn't fair, but I just proposed 19 Saurians as Lizards having an elite army since 19 Star Dragons and 19 Stegadons were mentioned, and someone else said they'd lose to 19 Shades. Which, they can, but they won't against AI in the campaign where you're Lizards, which was the intended initial context. Obviously unfair and a bit silly as an actual fight.

[funkmonster7]

Origineel geplaatst door Quillithe:

Origineel geplaatst door funkmonster7:

19 Shades with Shadowdart (or Barbstorm) lord will beat 19 Dread Saurians doomstack. But you can't just sit the Shades down and shoot them, or put them on Skirmish mode and expect them to work like Waywatchers. Shades can counter monster armies but you need to micro, play it like chess. Throw away a pawn as fodder while the rest keep shooting. Abuse Stalk and run away while the fodder gets routed, etc.

Fair enough - certainly against an AI saurian stack this would crush them because they'd also send more than 1 Saurian at the fodder. A player might make this more difficult by spreading his saurians out enough that you can't really flank them, but I can still believe the shades could win with campaign bonuses.

If it's a player vs player, doomstack vs doomstack, choosing Shades would be a mistake. A thinking player who has enough money to field 19 Dread Saurians will, upon seeing an enemy Shades unit, know to count how many enemy Shades units remaining, and can counter the strategy before charging into a death trap. Even with campaign bonuses, the player with 19 Shades will surely lose. Shades aren't anti-monster missile units, and if one's opponent can pick 19 Dread Saurians for an army choice, one can pick much better army choices than a Shades doomstack.

The only reason why in campaign, Shades doomstacks are some of the most powerful doomstacks is simply the fact that the DE can churn out a ton of these relatively early in the game, and they persist until late game. You can go 1v1 as DE, but if the enemy uses a much more costly doomstack, you can easily bring 2-3 more armies to overrun your enemy. DE economy is what makes Shades doomstacks OP in campaign, not the Shades themselves (although they are very powerful for their cost).

[Happy]

As per the title, Lizardmen, easily.

[chronobomb]

Origineel geplaatst door Slap Happy Pappy:

Origineel geplaatst door chronobomb:

You get followers that can completely eliminate the cost of buildings.
-Charnel Valley Necrotect follower
-Skeletal Laborers

He isn't wrong, but by the time this comes on line it becomes a moot point.

I am on turn 45 and have two branches of buildings free. I will take to turn 90 before I can get all 4 types of buildings free,

I'd hardly call this too late to matter.

[Danny Z. Ninja]

Dwarf Ironbreakers, Organ Guns, Flame Cannons, and Hammerers
Lizardmen Templeguard, Stegadons, and Carnosaurs
High Elf Dragon Princes, Phoenix Guard, and Swordmasters of Hoeth

[Slap Happy Pappy]

Hardest to afford? Early chaos or mid game Norsca.

Most expensive? Probably heroes on dragons or steggies