Ultimate Guide - Wood Elves - Sisters of Twilight

Guide to the Sisters of Twilight Wood Elves campaign in the Vortex.

Notes from my Playthrough

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Notes from my playthrough, 12.30.2020.

Some of these area quite important, so definitely read this section:


NOTE FOR MYSELF: Burning Head and The Penumbral Pendulum had their AP damage nerfed
recently.


SUPER IMPORTANT!!!: Tree Kin have the "Siege Attacker" trait. Haunted Groves should be a building you get early, not later like I did.


If you beat The Root of Chaos before destroying Clan Moulder, you still have to destroy Clan Moulder in order to beat the campaign.



You want to try and get trade if you can, and you want to build resource buildings in your outposts when able. I have trade agreements worth 2700 and 2000 gold respectively in my campaign, which allows me to run 5 armies without a deficit, otherwise I would be at a significant deficit.



At the start of the campaign The Deeproot has a 10 turn cooldown. Once you get 3-4 of the Forests, the cooldown drops to 1 turn.



Make sure you have over 20,000 gold before you confederate Oreon's Camp. Even if you disband 1 of his 2 armies, if you already have 2 armies, even if they are only Glade Guard, you will still probably run a 2-3k deficit.

I'm not sure how long it takes after you discover the faction, I'll have to check my save files, but for Oreon's, an encounter appears that will allow you to pay 5000 gold to confederate them, or fight a battle to show who is boss and force them to confederate. I paid the gold.

For Gaean Vale, an event will happen where a Chaos army will spawn next to the vale and appears scripted to destroy the Vale so that you can colonize it. Then the High Elves will ask that you give the Vale back to Avelorn, which you can do, or you can fight them to keep it, and then suffer -diplomacy with High Elves for awhile.

The Sacred Pools was occupied by a Lizardmen faction originally when I checked it out, but when I finally got around to taking it, Luthor Harkon's faction The Awakened had captured it, which made it really easy to take since the defenses sucked.



If you capture Gaean Vale, at Tier 3 you can build a Temple of Isha which allows you to build the Tree units up to Treeman. Keep that in mind when deciding on what to build in The Witchwood.


The Sacred Pools has the "Sacred Pools of Isha" building which gives +3 rank to Lore of Life lords and heroes, and allows you to recruit Zoats and Sisters of the Thorn.


Heart of the Jungle (Oreon's) special building gives +2 rank to Glade Captains (apparently not Glade Lords, which sucks)

Resources

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https://www.pcinvasion.com/warhammer-2-wood-elves-rework-guide/

Vortex Walkthrough

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NOTE: You get Ariel once you get The Witchwood to 100 Forest Health. The Sisters' Forest Dragon Quest becomes available at Rank 12, and requires you to add a Spellweaver to the Sisters' army. I already had the starting Spellweaver in the Sisters' army, which caused the quest to complete, but then I never got any follow up, it may have bugged out. Maybe a work around being to remove the Spellweaver just before the Sisters reach Rank 12 and then re-add the Spellweaver?

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IMPORTANT: As soon as you complete a tier of the Main Settlement building, as long as you have the money, you can start building the next tier. So what about growth? Growth for Wood Elves is turned into "Kindreds" that are required if you want to build and then upgrade any of the 3 "Infrastructure" buildings that give you income, as well as for the "Military Support" buildings. The 1st Tier of the "Defence" buildings does not need Kindreds, but the tiers above do.

"Trapper's Den" and "Craftmen's Tree" chains give you growth in your settlement, but not much. To get more, you can build structures in your outposts that boost growth. You have 3 Outpost options for Growth, but I'll keep it simple for you. In all 4 settlements of the Obsidian Peaks province, and in Tyrant Peak and Ancient City of Quintex, build "Worldroot Pathway" for your Outpost building. This will allow you to recruit Glade Guard from whatever direction you end up going conquering in. It would suck to only build the "Worldroot Pathway" in Tyrant Peak and be fighting east, lost most of your force in a hard battle, and that have to trek all the way back to Tyrant Peak instead of just to Ice Rock Gorge.

"Glade Guard" are you basic archer units, they are great, and they will be your bread and butter for a long time. "Worldroot Pathway" reduces their cost by 50% (including if recruited from the Global Pool), so it is even better to get them from that Outpost building than from the Copse in the Witchwood, and same with Hagbane Tips Glade Guard which you would get from the Glade Guard Hide if you built it, they are too expensive at the start plus building the "GG Hide" would screw your income at the start, no good. Because of this, you will not even be building a Glade Guard Hide for a bit or recruiting any units from The Witchwood.


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SISTERS OF TWILIGHT SKILLS

Right here I'll go ahead and advise your starting skill choices for the Sisters. Get Ever-Reaching Tendrils (Blue Line) > Inspiring Presence (Red Line) > max Bolts of the Forest > then go down the blue line to get Lightning Strike and Home Amongst the Boughs". At Rank 12, get Inseverable > Arahan's Reckoning > Naestra's Vigilance. After that up to you. If you add a few Tree Kin or Treemen to the Sisters' army, then max "Ancient Bark".

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WALKTHROUGH

Turn 1: You start in the Witchwood with a Trapper's Den and Selathoi Gallery. Keep those, and build "Grape Vines", you need the +600 income. Also start building the Tier 2 Settlement building "Glade", which will take 8 turns. Attack the nearby Orcs, fighting is better if you want to preserve your troops as autoresolve will kill your eternal guard, but if you hate fighting the first battle then that would be ok since you are going to replace them with Glade Guard anyway, you can just keep rolling along faster if you keep the Eternal Guard until it is time to disband them. Keep the Great Stags and Great Eagle for now as well. After killing the Orcs, capture Ice Spire and build the "Worldroot Pathway" and repair the main building. Go ahead and pay the exorbitant amount to get 3 Glade Guard via Global Recruitment in Ice Spire. Make sure you are researching the First Technology. End Turn.

Turn 2: Recruit another 3 Glade Guard in Ice Spire. End Turn.

Turn 3: Move to the edge of Ice Spire region in the direction of Temple of Addaioth, and then encamp. Recruit 3 local and 1 global Glade Guard (you won't have enough money to get 3 more from global). End Turn.

Turn 4: Orcs will attack The Witchwood. You should be able to auto-resolve it for the win, choose the money option. I think I moved my army toward Temple of Addaioth and encamped and recruited 2 more Glade Guard, because on Turn 5...

Turn 5: I had a full stack, and more orcs were at the edge of The Witchwood, and a Forest Encounter event had occurred, causing a little icon to appear to the northwest of Temple of Addaioth. I attacked the orc army, auto-resolved them for easy win. Then I moved onto the encounter, and auto-resolved a battle with some generic Skaven. Then I captured Temple of Addaioth, and built another "Worldroot Pathway".

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TECH TALK BREAK: Get "Ellnill, Lord of Destruction", then "Anath Raema, the Savage Huntress". Then go "Vaul" > "Ladrielle" > "Hoeth" > "Kurnous" > "Estreath, Lord of Hunger". Then "Isha, the Mother" for additional income from grapes. Then I would go "Drakira" >>> "Cytharai".

One second thought, going for "Cytharai" right after getting Anath Raema may be better (immediately followed by "Atharti, Lady of Desire"), because there were times I was quite frustrated by the 2 turns needed for Global Recruitment.

Your choice, income/less upkeep or easier to recruit far from home.

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BUILDING CHOICES BREAK: Once The Witchwood Tier 2 is complete, build the "Sacred Grounds of Anath Raema" and the "Craftmen's Tree". Upgrade the Selathoi Gallery to Tricksters Gallery. Once Tricksters Gallery is built, recruit 2 Glade Captains, and then demolish the Tricksters Gallery. Once you get The Witchwood to Tier 3, build Haunted Goves in place of the gallery, and then upgrade the Groves to Tribal Stones ASAP so that you can get a Branchwraith, and then upgrade it again ASAP in order to get a 2nd Branchwraith. You can upgrade it to a Moonstone Clearing at Tier 5 if you want to recruit Treeman units, otherwise you don't need to spend the money.


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Turn 6 and Beyond: Because Keshta Vault and Ice Rock Gorge were ruins and I could come back for them, I ended up heading toward Tyrant Peak, which I easily took. I then chose to take Clarak Spire, which caused me to be at war with Drakla Coven for ages although they never attacked me. I'm torn about this decision, because on one hand it started that war that might have caused me problems later if the Dark Elves had attacked me, because I did not finish them off immediately, so I may have gotten lucky, and that is something I would advice against risking. On the other hand, Clarak Spire had a port, which may have enabled me to trade with people, and trade is HUGE! I ended up making friends with Exiles of Nehek, although I could have chosen to kill them off I suppose, they got real annoying with their diplomacy requests.

After taking Clarak Spire, I killed off some Beastmen, then I I ended up recruiting a 2nd Army and had it colonize Keshta Vault and Ice Rock Gorge, while the Sisters' army went to take Ancient City of Quintex and follow that up by destroying Morathi's faction.

At Turn 10, when you have your first chance to Deeproot, I would recruit a lord in The Witchwood, deeproot that lord to Oreon's Camp to discover them, then immediately disband that lord. Why? Because eventually an event should occur which will allow you to confederate Oreon's faction by either paying 5000 gold or fighting a battle with their army but not against their settlement, so that you don't have to damage their oak. At that point, when you are prepared, you can send an army to that encounter to either pay the gold or fight the battle. This will reward you Oreon's Camp and probably 2 Glade Captains and maybe a Spellweaver or 2. This will probably put you way over budget, so be prepared for that, you will probably need to disband one of the armies.

Tretch Interrupts This Program...

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Tretch Craventail...

Was an absolute pain in my keester the whole campaign until I finally said screw this and focused on his complete destruction.

He was basically impervious to my missiles (which was all my damage), so I had to focus on killing all his troops to force him to break and rout.

I would push into his territory with one army that was not strong enough to beat him when he holed up in a Major Settlement and had reinforcements, my Glade Guards would run out of arrows before he ran out of troops. And then when I retreated that army to recover, he would take his territory back.

Had to send 2 armies to dismantle his empire and hunt him down.


Be warned, I recommend destroying Tretch's faction before moving on, he is that much of a pain.

Walkthrough Continued

The Other Trees

In my campaign, I discovered Gaean Vale and then disbanded the discovering lord. After confederating Oreon's, I got an event saying Alarielle of Avelorn calls for help, because Chaos is attacking the Vale. I don't know what happens if you get an army there and try to kill Chaos, but if you do not do so that same turn, Chaos will raze Gaean Vale, allowing you to colonize it without having to fight Avelorn.

HOWEVER. If you re-colonize the Vale, before you invest in it, be advised you will get a Forest Encounter saying the High Elves want you to give the Vale back to Avelorn, which you can do which will immediately revert Gaean Vale to Avelorn's control at Tier 1, or you can fight a High Elf army, which will cause -50 diplomacy will all High Elves for 5 turns. And from my campaign, Avelorn will probably end up attacking you, followed by the rest of the High Elves.

Now, a couple things. 1) I'm not sure anything forces you to complete the encounter, which means you don't have to make a choice and could just continue to the end of the game with the status quo??? 2) If you give the Vale back to Avelorn immediately after re-colonizing it (I would say don't spend any money on it obviously but it looks like it refunded me my building costs when I returned the Vale to them), you get a big favorability boost with the High Elves. You could use this to try and get NAP and Trade with all the High Elves (except Avelorn) first, and then you *could* declare war on Avelorn and take the Vale back. I tested this out by giving the Vale back and immediately retaking it, and it looks like this only gave me a -1 modifier for being at war with Avelorn (in my case I had a NAP and Military Access agreement with Avelorn so I took a huge reliability hit when testing this, and one of the High Elf factions had an additional -1 for broken treaties with Avelorn while another did not). So obviously if you plan to take the Vale right back, don't make any treaties with Avelorn upon discovering them.


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The Sacred Pools was simple, you deeproot there, capture it, then I recommend becoming buddies with The Huntsmarshal's Expedition and Defenders of the Great Plan (who gave me SO much money for treaties and going to war with their enemies). Markus was more difficult but I believe I also got my first Trade Agreement with him. After becoming buddies with those 2, I saw that The Awakened held Tlax which I needed to restore the forest's health. Since I was already at war with The Awakened (because they had taken The Sacred Pools from the Lizardmen by the time I got there), I fought that direction and ended up conquering The Awakening and destroying Luthor Harkon's The Awakened faction). Unfortunately, because I joined war against Clan Skryre in order to get lots of money from the Defenders of the Great Plan, Ikit came and took all the coastal outposts I had taken from Luthor, but he never proceeded further toward The Sacred Pools, so that was good.


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Back to Oreon's, becoming buddies with Settra's Khemri faction is a great idea, 1 because if you end up at war with him, you are in for an absolute slog, but also I got a Trade Agreement with him, and by the end of my campaign that was earning me 3891 gold per turn.

Winning the Vortex Campaign

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1) You must perform 2 Rituals of Rebirth (so The Witchwood and one of the other 3 trees. You can do all 4 of them if you want to).

2) Fight the Final Battle (basically the same battle you fight as Throt but on the Wood Elf side. Be aware you will be attacked from 3 sides during the fight).

3) Destroy Clan Moulder.

^ I put that one last because that was a headache for me. I easily won the Final Battle, but then I had to go north and northeast past Malekith searching for Clan Moulder and capturing all the settlements. Was not difficult at all, just time consuming. I would have started working toward that goal sooner if I had realized that winning the Final Battle would not just end the campaign. Which I should have known because that is how it was with Grom the Paunch, ah well.

Army Build Guide

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Given how short on heroes you are going to be, this will assume just your first 2 Armies:

1 Lord
1 Branchwraith
1 Glade Captain
1 Spellweaver
3 Tree Kin (or Treeman)
13 Glade Guard (ideally the more damaging Hagbane Tips version, or against armored enemies, Starfire Shafts)

The Tree Kin/Treeman units have Siege Attacker trait so you don't have to besiege before attacking, SUPER IMPORTANT because that was so annoying until I figured that out.


Other Armies:

1 Lord
1-2 Branchwraith (if you build a "Nimbus-Shrouded Copse" in all 4 Forests, you can have 9 Branchwraiths)
3-5 Tree Kin/Treeman
Rest Glade Guard


Now, if you are rolling in cash, you could replace the Glade Guard with Waywatchers, HOWEVER, by the time you are able to do this, you will probably have Glade Guard that are or are approaching Rank 7, which means they benefit from "Nature's Quiver", and it would be a shame to delete them. However, if you happen to lose Glade Guard in battle, upgrading them to Hagbane/Starfire or Waywatchers would then be a good idea.


Hagbane vs Starfire

Hagbane does more base damage and inflicts poison, whereas Starfire is armor-piercing. Hagbane is fantastic against low-armor enemies, a full stack of them slows the enemy down so that you barely need tanking units, and does more base damage. However, against Dwarves/Lizardmen or armies with monstrous units, Starfire is probably better. Evidenced by Waywatchers being armor-piercing and they do crazy damage.

Lord Choices and Skill Builds

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PHILOSOPHY

The Ancient Treeman Lord is an excellent Lord because he has Earthblood (AoE Heal) and Shield of Thorns (AoE defensive buff) so he can keep himself and his Tree Kin/Treeman buddies healed up while they tank for your Glade Guard as they rain death on your foes. He is what you choose if you want your lord helping to tank the enemy so you need one less tank unit so you can bring another caster or Glade Guard.

However, it appears the Ancient Treeman (and Branchwraiths) get separate traits from Spellweavers, and they do not appear to get "Talon of Kurnous" which gives +15% Range to the whole army. "Talon of Kurnous" is a fantastic trait for a Glade Guard/Waywatcher heavy army, combined with "Nature's Quiver" it means they would get +25% Range, which means 213 Range on Glade Guard and 238 Range on Waywatchers.

Also, the "Sacred Grounds of Anath Raema" gives +3 Lord Rank to Lore of Beasts casters (lord and hero), so you can recruit Lore of Beasts Spellweavers at a higher level.



The Spellweaver Lord is, well, your caster lord who can be put on a flying mount to get around quickly and either heal with Life or High magic, or do damage with the others.



Glade Lord is an in-between, can do damage from range without needing magic, and then charging into melee, but that is the idea, he or she is meant to charge the edges and get out when things get hairy, as opposed to the Ancient Treeman who is to get stuck in.



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SKILLS FOR ALL LORDS

>>> BLUE LINE ESSENTIALS (= 13 skill points):

::: Ever-Reaching Tendrils (Route Marcher by another name) > 3x Obscuring Canopy > 2x Wonders of the Forest > Open Branches > Lightning Strike > 3x Quartermaster > 1x Perenniality > Home Amongst the Boughs


>>> RED LINE ESSENTIALS (= 10 skill points):

::: Inspiring Presence > 3x Bolts of the Forest > 3x Ancient Bark > Rally > Nature's Quiver > The Forest's Roar

IMPORTANT: You can save 3 points here if you decide not to go for Nature's Quiver or Forest's Roar by not getting Rally. You can save a further 3 points if you only have Glade Guard in your army.


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ANCIENT TREEMAN

You want "Skin of the Woods" if you run Tree Kin (but don't need if you run Treeman). "The Skewering Branch" is also decent for Tree Kin but can be skipped to apply a point elsewhere. You want "Rain of Spines" if you run any ranged units.

COMBAT LINE ESSENTIALS: You really want "Impenetrable Bark" because that will make your Ancient Treeman an absolute unit. All the combat skills would be could, but you can skip Dead Onslaught, and maybe even Violent Delights if you absolutely must.

You REALLY want Earth Blood.

MAGIC LINE ESSENTIALS: 1x Awakening of the Wood > 2x Earth Blood > 2x Shield of Thorns > Evasion > Magical Reserves > 2x Regrowth > 1x The Dweller's Below > Ancient Conduit

If you have the points, you can go "Possessed by the Trickster God" or "Howl of the Forest" depending on whether you want to go more offense or defense. On Very Hard Battle Dificulty I'd probably go Melee Defense and let your Glade Guard do the killing, on Normal you could probably go Melee Attack.

^ If LegendofTotalWar has a better breakdown of what you should do, let me know in the comments and I'll update.

If running the suggested Tree Kin/Treeman with Glade Guard army, I think the minimum skills for the Ancient Treeman is Route Marcher, 3x Boltds of the Forest and 3x Ancient Bark, 2x Impenetrable Bark and 2x Earth Blood, and Rain of Spines = 15 points spent, with 24 to use as you see fit.


Giving how good the Ancient Treeman will be with maxed Combat and Magic + Red Line Essentials, might be a lord to skip trying to go for "Home Amongst the Boughs" on, and just get Ever-Reaching Tendrils + whatever Blue you can get with spare points.


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SPELLWEAVER

I messed up on some of my Spellweavers, but I was able to get a Lore of Beasts Spellweaver that was probably the ideal Spellweaver Lord build with this:

Essential Blue Line (13 points) > Essential Red Line (10 points) > Immortality > Rain of Spines > Great Eagle > Forest's Fury > Weaver of the Winds > 1x Wyssans's Wildform > Wild Heart > 2x Flock of Doom > 1x (Pann's Pelt or Amber Spear, your preference) > Evasion > Magical Reserves > Transformation of Kadon > 2x Curse of Anraheir > Arcane Conduit

This allowed an effective spellcaster while being able to march far with buffed troops for less upkeep.

I think that is the ideal because I don't think the other skills are necessary.


Looking at the Lore of Dark Magic spells, I'm not a huge fan of that lore, so I would skip it.

After beating my campaign, I would probably recruit 1 Lore of Beasts Spellweaver to fill the "Beastbinder" office (and 1 High Magic for the Highweaver), but otherwise I'd go for Lore of Life or Lore of Shadows for everything else. Ancient Treeman can fill all the bottom offices, I'd put the Ancient Treeman in "Treesinger" and "Glamourweaver" offices, the Glamourweaver one is meh anyway.


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GLADE LORD

I never used one in my campaign, but probably:

Blue Line Essentials (13) > Red Line Essentials (10) > Forest Dragon > Immortality > Rain of Spines > max Combat Line (10) > Arrows of Kurnous > then either 2x Piercing Shots or Bottomless Quiver, your choice.

Or save the 3 points from the Ranged line and apply them elsewhere as you see fit. Maybe use a point to get the Great Stag Mount to try that out if you'd like.

NOTE - the Glade Lord (male) and Glade Lord (female) have the same skills, CA just separated them for the benefit of those who like to pick their lord's sex.

Forest Encounters & Invasions

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Forest Encounters are little blue glyph-looking icons that appear near a tree that you can move an army to be presented with 3 choices: Do nothing at the moment which means you can come back to the event later; take the peaceful option which means you fight a weaker enemy or don't have to fight at all but you will suffer a negative modifiers (often the tree spirits get mad at you causing issues if you run dryads or tree units); or face a battle (or a stronger version of the battle) for better rewards.


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Ritual of Rebirth Invasions start out similarly, when you start a Ritual of Rebirth, 3 little red glyph-looking icons will appear around the tree (often much further away than Forest Encounters, be prepared for how far away they can be, the ones near Gaean Vale were so far apart I had to choose one and the others spawned before I could get to them).

You get 3 turns as the forces build up where you can take them out before they spawn and in a weaker state. So if you have 3 armies waiting for them, you could destroy all 3 super easily.

Once they spawn, they will raid your territory. Per the guide linked in the Resources section, the author thinks they won't actually attack and raze your tree, just raid your territory for income, so that is nice at least.

Excellent Traits

Elf Lords

Talon of Kurnous = Range +15% for Lord's Army



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Ancient Treemen

Annoyance of Netlings = -10% movement range for enemy armies, and a debuff to their melee in radius around the Lord. (this combines well with the Branchwraith's "Annoyance of Netlings", which gives an additional -15% to Block Army, on top of its Block Army skill, which means the Branchwraith can reduce enemy armies movement by 80%, and the Ancient Treeman can bring that down an additional -10%)

Cluster of Radiants = Constant increased Winds of Magic rate.

Murderer of Spites = Poison Attacks, +15% Weapon Damage, and provides a constant aura that damages the enemy in melee. Also can be obtained on Branchwraiths.

Lamentation of Despars = constant 10% Ward Save for the lord.

Important Discoveries

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OFFICES:

Queen's Champion office says it requires Orion or a Glade Lord to fill, which appears to be correct.

However, when I clicked on the Sisters of Twilight and hovered over "Highweaver" and "Darkweaver", those offices said they required a wielder of High Magic and Dark Magic respectively. This does appear to apply correctly to Ancient Treeman lords, and Spellweavers of the Lord of Life and Lore of Beasts, who cannot fill "Highweaver" or "Darkweaver" offices. Lore of High Magic Spellweaver can occupy "Highweaver" but not "Darkweaver", and vice versa. However, I recruited a Lord of Shadows Spellweaver Lord, and am able to put that lord in either of those 2 offices. Obviously you want a Spellweaver with matching Lore of Magic to fill the office for the best use of it. Interesting that I can get a Spellweaver of Shadow magic lore with a good trait like "Talon of Kurnous" and have them fill the office until I can get a Spellweaver with the right magic but a good trait to fill the role.

Note that the offices that the Spellweaver Lords best fill match their Lores of Magic.

High Magic = Highweaver
Dark Magic = Darkweaver
Life Magic = Treesinger of Isha
Beast Magic = Beastbinder of Kurnous
Shadow Magic = Glamourweaver of Loec


Note that Ancient Treeman lords can cast Lore of Life magic, so either a Lore of Life Spellweaver or an Ancient Treeman can readily fill the Treesinger of Isha office.



Keep your starting Spellsinger hero with the Sisters, if you do then you will automatically complete the first step in the Quest to get your Forest Dragon mount. However... I did this, but then never got the follow up quest to get my Forest Dragon mount, so I think it bugged out.

FIGHT IN FORESTS!!!

Learned this from watching one of LegendofTotalWar's youtube videos when he was playing as the Wood Elves:


When they are in Forest terrain on a battlefield, casters (Branchwraiths, Spellweavers, Spellsingers, Ariel, etc... he didn't mention Ancient Treeman but I would think them as well) receive the effect "Cluster of Radians", which apparently is an constant passive Arcane Conduit effect.


This tidbit goes along with the other protip concerning forests:

You archer units are fine to fight in the open, but if you have Treemen or Treekin units, you should do your best to place them in forest terrain and force the enemy to fight them in the forest. The forest gives some protection from enemy arrows, and your units receive combat buffs from fighting in the forest.

Heroes

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GLADE CAPTAIN

You only need 1 Glade Captain per army, mainly for the increased campaign movement (keep in mind the movement bug that results from having this hero in your army, it messes up the accuracy of how much movement you have left to go into encamp), but it is also a heavily armored hero that can shoot at range and fight in melee, and is useful on foot, on a Great Stag, or on a Great Eagle.

If you skip "Elven Steed" and "Ward of Hoeth" skills, you can get every combat skill unlocked along with maxed "Increase Mobility" skill.


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BRANCHWRAITH

A hero I wish I had gotten earlier. The Branchwraith can increase replenishment for your armies (although my armies seemed to have great replenishment already, not sure if this is the best use of this hero). It can stimulate growth (base 10, increased to 40 with the skill maxed), which would be excellent for placing in The Witchwood early (on second thought nevermind, I'll explain elsewhere). It can Damage Walls and Block Armies, the Damage Walls ability being needed if you do not bring any Tree Kin or Treeman units. They are Melee heroes who can be made beastly, AND they have Earth Blood for healing which is fantastic.

Branchwraiths "may" be impacted by the "Sacred Grounds of Anath Raema", because with the tech researched and that building, I was able to recruit Rank 6 Branchwraiths when I finally did.


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WAYSTALKER

You can have max Specialist + Assassinate + Assault Garrison + Assault Units, and then every combat and special skill except Ward of Hoeth at Level 40.

Personally, I would just use the Waystalker as a scout for your armies(knowing where the pesky Skaven are) and as a softener of the enemy with Assault Units + Assault Garrison to thin their ranks and assassinating embedded enemy heroes.

He is too soft to tank for your army, Branchwraiths are MUCH better. I think he does decent at sniping single units, but then again so do your Glade Guards/Waywatchers. Honestly if you just use outposts to get your Glade Guard and never build the Deepwood Camp and Asrai Forge then you won't have access to him, and honestly you probably will not miss him.


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SPELLSINGER

You start with a Lore of Beasts Spellsinger.

Note that you only get +1 Spellsinger "Roots of Ghyran" chain you build, so a max of 5 Spellsingers in the Sisters' Vortex campaign. Choose wisely.

You get the choice of Lore of Beasts, Life, or Shadows. Beasts will get the +3 Rank from "Sacred Grounds of Anath Raema" so they can start at a higher level. Beasts can summon a Great Eagle twice which can be useful if you remember to do it to send it in to stall the enemy, probably is it doesn't do much damage and is degrades over time, and costs a lot of Winds of Magic. Beasts has Flock of Doom, which I found a little disappointing the further I got into the campaign. After finishing the campaign, I'd probably go with Life or Shadows next time.

Life is great because of Earthblood and Regrowth, and would be a good choice.

Shadow has Pit of Shades which I remember being devastating. Apparently "The Penumbral Pendulum" recently had its AP damage nerfed, but that doesn't matter, you put 2 points into "The Enfeebling Foe" and 2 points into "The Withering" and then for for "The Pit of Shades" which is the real money maker.

Pick your favorite lore and level them up and put them on a Great Eagle and have fun.

Technology

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Note that "Hukon, the Sunderer" tech DOES NOT give +15 charge to "Tree Kin", apparently only to Treemen units, in addition to Zoats and Forest Dragons.

"Wisdom of the Poplar" DOES NOT reduce Global Recruitment duration, only normal recruitment duraiton.


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BEST AMBER TECH

I believe you get 1 amber when you get Ariel upon hitting 100 Forest Health in The Witchwood. So which Amber Tech should you pick first, especially since the other ones might be a while coming?

I chose Wisdom of the Yew for the 15% Reload Time Reduction, however...

I think I should have chosen Wisdom of the Ash for the +35% Ammo and +10 Diplomacy with other Factions.

Because you can run out of ammo really easily. And because Trade will be hugely beneficial, so anything that could help you secure Trade Agreements quicker and easier is great.


If you were playing a Durthu or Drycha campaign, or just going doomstacks of Treeman units lead by Ancient Treeman, then I would definitely pick Wisdom of the Pine especially early on for the -25% construction time and -15% Upkeep for tree-type units.


Those are definitely the top 3, the rest are a bit disappointing given how hard it is to get Amber.

Defense Tip

I just had a thought which I have not tested yet but I think it may be useful.

I wasn't a huge fan of the Waystalker in my campaign, and like I said in the Heroes section, would be good to use them as a Scout and for their Assassinate, Assault Units and Assault Garrison skills.

Expanding on this, it may be a good idea to get Waystalkers and then level them up to where they have at least max level Specialist and Assault Units skills (and have them assault units about 3+ times in order to get a trait that gives an additional 15% to damage inflicted which means that the hero should inflict 45% casualties), and then station them around forest settlements that you have no armies near, so they can detect if the AI is incoming early and then start assaulting those attacking armies to shred their unit health down so that if they do attack your settlement, they should be easy pickings for your defenders.

[MinMaxRex]

@Golanth - Good question, not sure. I would ask that in the weekly question & answer thread here:

https://www.reddit.com/r/totalwar/

And let me know what they say, and I'll update.

[Golanth]

Does the murder of spites trait stack with itself, or is it unique per army?