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Total War Warhammer/Tactics/Dwarfs

2023-06-12T18:12:46Z

2A02:1810:4E2C:A900:DC0E:597F:F427:CBEB: /* Ranged Infantry */

{{Topquote|Kazukhan-kazakit-ha! (Look out, the Dwarfs are on the warpath!)|Game battle chant for Dwarfs, if you think about it, it should be look <s>down</s> THAT'S A GRUDGE!}}
This is the tactics page for the Total War: Warhammer version of The Dwarfs.

==Why play Dwarfs?==
*Because you want to sit and watch as your enemies are blasted away while coming towards you.
*Cause you're under 5'5 and want '''vengeance''' for all the short jokes.
*You don't want to do too much micro, so an army without much in the way of mobility and cavalry doesn't bother you as much.
*You enjoy having infantry that won't die after being slapped by a wet noodle.
*Slay everything without a beard!!
*FLAMETHROWERS!!!

===Pros===
*'''Durability''': You are a tank faction. Most of your units are categorized with high armour, melee defense and leadership. Even your tier one and chaff are very tanky compared to counterparts from other factions. This is further supplemented by the innate magic resist many of your units have, which ''slightly'' compensates for your otherwise complete lack of magic. Additionally, with their naturally high leadership, dwarfs do not usually break unless hopelessly outnumbered or if you screw up massively by getting cavalry charged in the rear. Frankly, your units will hold out forever.
**Your magic resistance got nerfed in the third game to ''only'' resist magical spells. Still useful, but now units with magic attacks, I.E Daemons, are going to be way better at cracking you open.
*'''Range''': Guns, guns and more guns! Dwarfs have some of the best blackpowder units in the entire game. Thunderers and Cannons can lay a whooping on anything they are firing on, and their artillery isn't anything to sneer at. Even their non-AP range units are very good for their price, and it's not hard for them to earn their points back as long as they are defended.
*'''If they get close, Nut 'em!''': As if being being one of the best factions at shooting was not enough, their missile units can also hold their own in close quarters better than most.
*'''Airforce''': Gyrocopters with their anti large can get you control over the air, and their ability to kite monsters into oblivion is a good skill to have. Even Gyrobombers have a niche for their blob killing capabilities after recent buffs.
*'''Runes''': Where other races rely on the fickle Winds of Magic, you have your reliable runes. Runes supply surprisingly good buffs and debuffs that can help your army out, making them a great way to make sure your infantry stays in the fight a bit longer. The fact that they aren't limited by a power reserve also means that they'll remain a viable option well into the latter stages of a fight, where other factions might begin to tap out of their mystical power.
*'''Anti-large''': You laugh when the enemy brings big monsters. With all your AP missiles, Anti Large artillery and slayers, you have the one of the easiest times killing monsters out of any faction in the game.
*'''Strong Economy''': It's campaign specific but yeah, it turns out the species who's renowned for being the best at making shit is also one of the best at making money. The resource building chains go up to level IV instead of stopping at level III, you can mass produce Dwarf Beer anywhere. Putting together Doomstacks of Top Tier Dawi troops is easier.
*'''Good for Beginners''': Everyone was just starting once, if you are new to Warhammer Total War or just Total War in general the Dawi are (ironically enough) forgiving. Something like the Wood Elves is fragile and has a limited margin for error, Dwarfs on the other hand have more of a fudge factor in most match ups. Not to say that it's easy mode playing dwarfs, but the likelihood of things going pear shaped in a second is lower.

===Cons===
*'''Lack of Mobility''': With no Cav, monsters and slow infantry, Dwarfs are the least mobile faction in the game. You will spend the majority of the game standing still.
*'''Lack of Magic''': Though your most recent rework makes your runes a damn good alternative, you don't really have magic. This can pose a problem when you face similarly physically durable armies in battle and lack a reliable, magical alternative for damage. Additionally, though you defensively have a 25% resistance to the arcane, many large vortex spells will still sting quite a bit and your complete lack of magical healing means it'll be hard to bounce back from the damage you do take.
*'''Chariots''': Chariots are the bane of a Dwarf players existence. They don't have any real way to lock them down and, as you'd expect, AP anti infantry can really kill what the Dwarfs want to do on the battlefield. Due to the rework to how bracing and knock down works, this isn’t as bad as before, but chariots can still be a problem
*'''Predictability''': Most veteran players know what's going to happen when Dwarfs are picked. They are going to go for a cheap, numerous and sturdy front line and a lot of guns and artillery. This means that Dwarfs are easy to plan for as they only have one real viable tactic. Building an army around fighting Dwarfs is something players from all races know how to do.
*'''Lack of Good Lord Options''': Do you like the Runelord or Thorek? No? Well you better start because in multiplayer they're your only viable options. Grombrindal is an ok duelist but honestly Dwarf lords in general kind of suck. With no mounts and no way to stick to their targets it's hard for them to get anything done. This problem got better with the Twisted and the Twilight due to the changes to knockdown effects, but sticking to targets will still be hard
*'''Hard campaign''': With all the changes to the factions around them, the Dawi have fallen on some pretty hard times. The lifetime of WH2 dotted the landscape around Karaz-A-Karak alone with a huge number of guaranteed enemies that you will have to look out for, with your most reliable allies in the Empire being very far away. The other subfactions don't fare much better and your slow growth seriously hurts your ability to expand, especially when compared with your most dominant enemies, the Greenskins of the Badlands and Clan Mors further down the road.
*'''Bad in Domination''': Turns out your stubby little legs makes it really hard for you to capture objectives. Due to your lack of mobility you can't effectively capture points since other factions can just out race you to them and get more units on them. As such, you're widely considered the weakest faction in Domination.
*'''DLC''': A con for everyone, but fortunately you get off easier than many others. Unfortunately, a couple of your best units, namely Runelords and Rangers, are in fact locked behind DLC and if you want to really use your Dwarfs to the fullest, you'll need to pay the toll.

==Universal Traits==

*'''The Great Book of Grudges''': The fact that the sacred Dammaz Kron went unmentioned on this pages for so long merits an entry on its own. The Book of Grudges documents every slight committed against your faction, including legendary grudges that you start out with. Whenever something bad happens, i.e. you lose a settlement, get raided or a hostile faction repeatedly trespasses on your turf without you allowing it, it merits an entry in the book. These entries can (and will) accumulate over time, and depending on how much your Dorfs disliked the transgression, will vary in severity, which fills up a meter that gives you some penalties and some bonusses. High severity from unresolved Grudges gives you minor public order and research speed penalties, but it also gives all of your armies a charge bonus (since the Dwarfs are so pissed off) and increases the chance of Slayers and Giant Slayers popping up in your Regiments of Renown pool, where they can then be recruited instantly into your armies. Resolving Grudges and Legendary Grudges (such as retaking Karak Eight Peaks as Belegar Ironhammer) also earns you powerful bonusses (money, Oathgold, small buffs for the entire faction ) and special Runes.
*'''Oathgold''': The secondary resource of the Dwarfs. Practically identical to the Mortuary Cult of the Tomb Kings, with the key difference being that the Dwarfs can make much more stuff with Oathgold and that the stuff is much more abundant. Oathgold is earned through resolving Grudges, doing missions and quests, Gold Mines and some special buildings such as the Brightstone Mine in Mount Gunbad. Oathgold, combined with trade goods, can be used to create items for your Lords and Heroes, which makes it downright trivial to kit out every single character on the map with some special gizmos to make them really powerful. Oathgold can also be used to make Character and Banner Runes, the former can be applied as equipment to individual characters (with up to 3 individual runes at maximum), the latter functions like Banners that you can give units to give them special bonusses and abilities.
*'''Expert Charge Defense''': Barring Slayers, every single one of your units has Expert Charge Defense, which nullifies charge bonusses and also the momentum of units charging into your staunch line of angry Dwarfs.
*'''Magic Resistance''': Every Dwarf has a built in 25% Magic Resist (Spell Resist in WH3). Consult the main page for WHFB Dwarfs as to why.

==Legendary Lords and Subfactions==
*'''Thorgrim Grudgebearer:''' The high king himself, and the only large non-war machine unit in your roster, as he is carried on a massive throne sled by some burly dwarfs, Thorgrim isn't huge on offence, better than say mid-tier combat lords, but he's mostly just a hard to kill brick of leadership. Dwarfs in range of him just become slightly harder to break, which isn't saying much given their default morale, and he's not easily sniped. This results in him being kind of underwhelming, you know he's not going to die like a bitch, but you also know that he's not exactly going to recoup even a quarter of his cost. Is kind of safe in campaign play for beginners, but Grombrindal is overall superior. - Pass.
*'''Ungrim Ironfist:''' The Slayer King, bane of anything taller than six feet, Ungrim is the opposite of Thorgrim; all offence, with low defence. Ungrim is actually pretty good in terms of being a hero-killer and monster-hunter, he's not going to solo Tyrion or Kroq-Gar, and don't even think of monster lords like Kholek or monstrous mounts such as a Tomb King on a War Sphinx, without a unit to bog them down. The problem with Ungrim is that while he can throw hands and live up to his title, he eats a lot of damage for a Dwarf, or just in general for a combat Lord, he's easy to snipe with massed missiles if caught in the open, and while he can butcher most things sent his way, he'll only be able to do this once or twice in a battle before he's at serious risk of dying. Don't let that 120 armour & Unbreakable make you think he's a tank, Ungrim's Melee Defence is quite low for a combat lord, and that low dwarf speed means he can by kited to death. Thorgrim lacks the damage to recoup his cost, Ungrim lacks the defence to recoup his costs. If playing with an ally that has access to Lore of Life he can be kept alive, but you're asking a lot of resources to support the Slayer King. - Pass.
*'''Grombrindal:''' THE WHITE DWARF, Grombrindal doesn't bring anything really special to the table, he's a decent duelist, although lacking the balls-to-the-wall offence of Ungrim Ironfist, Grombrindal is nowhere near as risky for a combat Lord. The flashbomb ability can lockdown mobile Heroes and give the White Dwarf a few easy hits. Doesn't quite bring much for the rest of the army, but is the best Legendary Lord for cost-benefit tradeoffs. He can fight, he can survive, and he can make the entire army Unbreakable with a reusable map-wide buff. - Niche but competitive in that niche. In Campaign, he is easily the best LL the Dwarfs offer. His blue skill tree affects ''your entire faction'' and the four blessings you can choose every 20 turns (10 after picking a specific skill) are all very powerful, a whopping +25% Research Rate is no joke, as are +10 Melee Attack and Defense for every unit in Grombrindals army.
*'''Belegar Ironhammer:'''(DLC) Belegar is really just a wall, he's harder to kill than Thorgrim as they have comparable stats, but he has a silver shield for 55% missile resistance. That's all. Just an insanely hard to kill Lord, sure his offence isn't terrible, being better than Thorgrim's on base stats and a nice buff can be popped to go higher. But honestly you're paying a lot for a Lord that won't die, and generally speaking Dwarfs in Total War: Warhammer aren't a faction that is centred around their generals or Heroes. No real wizards to throw high-impact spell effects, no mobile Heroes that can exploit small gaps to flank units or hunt down supporting pieces like buffers, wizards or artillery crews. The only upshot to taking Belegar's subfaction in multiplayer is getting access the Ancestor Heroes who are damned hard to kill, but are also the only Dwarf units that are scared of magic damage, which can sort of be a mind-games thing because the default assumption to seeing Clan Angrund picked is that Ancestor Heroes are on the field, so grab some magic damage to delete them, but then seeing that there are no ghost Dwarfs means that the magic damage is actually a big waste considering all Dwarfs have 25% Magic Resistance. - Pass.
*'''Thorek Ironbrow:'''(FLC): With the rework comes a new LL and Thorek serves this role, being the latest (and most likely last) new contender in the Lustrian Thunderdome in the Vortex Campaign, and starting at the southernmost tip of the map in Karak Zorn on Mortal Empires. He serves as a supercharged Runelord with access to a unique mount that messes quite a bit with enemy spellcasting and improved Runic Magic on his own part. In the campaign, his legendary conservativeness translates into bonusses for "traditional" Dwarfen ranged units like Quarrelers and Grudge Throwers. Not to worry though, since he starts with a Rune of Burning that makes the Catapult projectiles [[Awesome|FUCKING EXPLODE]] and dramatically increases the combat value of Quarrelers in his own Army quite significantly (arguably making them even better than Thunderers). His campaign goal revolves around finding several lost Dwarfen artifacts, which can then be used to craft powerful buffs for your whole faction. [[Derp|He also can make enemy casters explode.]] - Best Multiplayer Lord pick.

==Units==
===Generic Lords===
*'''Dwarf Lord:''' No, just no, he suffers from the same issue that the Legendary Lords suffer from, being too slow. But wait there's more, the generic Lord is easier to kill in combat, provides less army support, and does less damage. He's not even the cheapest option to help save costs. I mean he has a shield, but its only bronze. Unless you've got some kind of bet riding on a battle and there's a specific stipulation that you cannot use any other Lord, screw the money because he's too crap. That said compared to generic foot Lords in other factions he's quite difficult to kill, which is more advice for fighting Dwarf Lords in campaign really. PASS!
*'''Runelord:''' (DLC) Yes, yes yes. The one competitive General in multiplayer, the Runelord is just a walking bubble of passive buffs that make your low tier units good, and your good infantry units even better. Has good active abilities, like Master Rune of Oath & Steel which gives +30 armour to all dwarfs in range, or the Rune of Speed which adds 45% speed and 24 melee attack to all dwarfs in range. This is the Lord pick that supports the Dwarf army, and don't think he's some kind of wizard that dies when someone looks at him funny, while the melee defence is low at 40, the Runelord has the same 120 armour as the other Lords, plus up to 35% missile resistance, sharing 20% of that with nearby allies. Slapping him on an Anvil of Doom gives a special ability that causes enemy casters to automatically miscast for minor damage when near him. TL;DR fucks magic, gets buffs. - Good if you want Thorek but a bit cheaper.

===Legendary Heroes (Clan Angrund Only)===
[[Clan Angrund]] has such a strong relationship with their ancestors, they come back as ghosts. Like all ghosts, they have a 75% physical resistance instead of magic resistance, with magic attacks, Unbreakable, but no armor and less health than normal. They have Fear and Terror making them good at chasing the enemy off. They themselves are weak to magic attacks, but who takes that much offense magic against Dwarfs anyway?

*'''King Lunn Ironhammer:''' is one of the two ghost Thanes, being the offensive one, with slightly more Melee attack than a normal Thane.
*'''Halkenhaf Stonebeard:''' the other ghost Thane, being the most defensive of the par with significantly lower melee attack but a very high defense of 65 and silver shield, letting him minge with enemies for a protracted time to proc terror routs.
*'''Throni Ironbrow:''' Most likely to take as he is a Runesmith, so someone that needs protection while also being in the front lines.
*'''Dramar Hammerfist:''' the ghost engineer so paying extra for a harder to kill gun lines buffer and better at chasing away those that try to disrupt them.

===Heroes===
*'''Master Engineer:''' Basically a must if you're running more than 2 artillery pieces, buffs artillery, has a decent sniper rifle of his own, not great in a fight with anything beyond hound packs and light cavalry, so don't expect him to be an effective guard for the cannons he's buffing. However if there is another unit nearby casting Entrenchment right before they rout will make the unit hold the line and fight even after being routed. On campaign they also boost your army's mobility. Aaaaaand the Dwarf Rework happened, buffing him even further with the ability of the Vampirate Gunnery Wight to restore lost ammo to artillery pieces for up to five times. Just too good to miss out on if you're bringing a bunch of cannons (and who doesn't, honestly).
*'''Runesmith:''' Basically a squishier version of the Runelord, has many of the same buffs, both passive and active. With the Dwarf rework, these guys have gone from being merely decent to amazing. While utilizing a rune puts every other rune on a shared cooldown, this only applies per caster; having multiple Runesmiths allows you to stack multiple buffs simultaneously or across multiple units without having to wait out the full 60 second global cooldown. They might not necessarily be an auto-include persay, but having one or two of these guys in your army is strongly recommended.
*'''Thane:''' While they still suffer from being slow, Thanes can be used more aggressively than Legendary Lords. Kit them out with the Rune of Slowness to gimp enemy mobility, or give them the Ironbeard's Ring and coordinate with a source of fire damage: Flame Cannons, Dragonback Slayers, Warriors of Dragonfire Pass, basic Irondrakes, or Brimstone Gyrocopters, all of these will deal serious damage to units inside the debuff aura.

===Infantry===
*'''Miners''': The closest thing to cannon fodder in the Dwarf Roster, miners are cheap AP units. Also give "speed" and breadth to Dawi list by vanguarding.
*'''Dwarf Warriors''': Did you know that a unit of Dwarf Warriors costs 475 gold but can hold against 3 units of Empire Swordsmen, costing 400 gold each, for just over 2 minutes and racking up roughly 90-100 kills before dying/breaking? Dwarf Warriors aren't great, just good, and are very much just a shield wall frontline. Dwarf Warriors are very cost-effective starting units. They will trade positively against most infantry that are tier 1-3 excluding units with high AP values or anti-infantry buffs. Dwarf Warriors aren't the same as elite heavy infantry however, they will break in time, if rear charged, if attacked by great weapon units, if hit with leadership debuffs, or if attacked by characters. This is a unit that buys time for a unit in the second line to get in position to assist, do not assume you can just deploy them as a single line and have artillery sit safely behind them.
**'''Warriors of Dragonfire Pass'''(ROR): Slightly better warriors that deal fire damage in combat, not a guaranteed pick most of the time, but good against any faction that is vulnerable to fire, consider pairing with a Thane carrying Ironbeard's Ring to boost damage.
*'''Dwarf Warriors (Great Weapons)''': You know how Dwarf Warriors can hold frontlines for a time but need a second line unit to assist them, this is cheapest of the second line units. Regular warriors have shields, 40 Melee Defence, and charge defence against large units, Warriors with Great Weapons don't have those defences, they get armour piercing damage which is the kind of offence needed to make up for the vanilla Warriors' shortcomings. Don't try and use them as a frontline unit, and replace them when you can with other melee infantry.
*'''Longbeards''': Warriors +1 really, they buff the leadership of other units (it's the generic Encourage passive so no stacking with Lords), so consider mixing them with warriors. Cost-wise your mostly paying for better Melee Defence, better Leadership, the leadership aura, and Immune to Psychology compared to vanilla Warriors. A common question is which is better for cost, Longbeards or Warriors, but outside of fighting undead armies that have tons of Fear/Terror effects, the answer to the question is; use both. While the differences between the two units are obvious in comparison, to the player on the other side of the battlefield it doesn't matter much because a Dwarf line is still a solid formation that is hard to break. Longbeards work good in the wings to buff leadership in the flanks, and having warrior units means you can save gold for more missile units and artillery.
*'''Longbeards (Great Weapons)''': While the difference between shield Warriors and shield Longbeards isn't much, the great weapon variant favours the Longbeards, which come with Charge Defense and Armor-Piercing (but no target specialization). In MP, where every gold coin counts, if all you need is cheap AP, take the Warriors, but if you want something tankier and able to encourage your Dwarfs to hold out a bit longer, take these guys.
**'''The Grumbling Guard'''(ROR): Not too bad, stat wise its a bit more armour & melee attack, 10 more leadership, and 13 more Melee Defence, which puts them at a whopping 51 Melee Defence. You don't get any improved damage output with these guys, instead you get an ability that replenishes 9% of vigour for them and nearby allies. This may not sound like much, but fatigue debuffs are crippling for units, and Dwarfs rely on grinding things out so even a small vigour buff to some units is good even if it just moves them from exhausted to very tired. But wait, this ability has infinite uses and a low cooldown so spam it away. While Hammerers do the same job but better, the Grumbling Guard are fantastic for keeping Ironbreakers in better condition than their enemies.
*'''Slayers''': Slayers are kind of weird. They're unbreakable, quick (for a Dwarf), hit hard, and do a lot of damage with no consideration to survivability. This means that they can seriously fuck up higher-tier units but on the same time are vulnerable to cannon fodder. It does not matter if you're a crappy Goblin with a crappy spear, it's getting through a Slayer's hide as much as a Chosen's Daemonforged Axe. When using Slayers, hold them back so that other units, especially ones with charge defense, take the brunt of the charge before moving the slayers to counter-attack, and while it might cost you the charge bonus, having them attack through the buffer unit really improves the lifespan of your Slayers (Probably much to their chagrin). Note that if you ever leave them in the open, missile units just have to imagine shooting them to wipe the unit, which is an expensive mistake. Also a definite must take against Vampire Counts and Tomb Kings with all their Fear effects but do not ever think about using them against Vampire Pirates because they will get shot to pieces before any Fear/Terror units get close for the Unbreakable to matter. Also, leave them at home against Wood Elves, or if you have fore-knowledge that your opponent likes horse-archer tactics.
*With the Dwarf rework that dropped together with Thorek Ironbrow, they went from terrible in Single Player to a pretty good choice for the early game, since you can now recruit them anywhere as long as your grudge meter is up. It also makes unlimited Slayer Doomstacks lead by Ungrim Ironfist a terrifying sight to behold.
**'''Dragonback Slayers'''(ROR): Slayers with better MA & MD, and they get physical resistance on top of the shield defense. The real value comes with their passive that activates in melee, it gives them fire damage, fire resistance, and applies slow debuff and the Flammable trait for weakness to fire (doesn't stack if the enemy already has the Flammable trait, but will stack with other effects of a different name that reduce fire resistance). The physical resist, slow debuff and the combo of fire damage and Flammable debuff makes this unit a generally better pick over vanilla Slayers, note that they do not get the fire resistance outside of combat so getting hit by flaming missiles outside of combat will hurt, the Lore of Fire spells are still subject to Dwarf magic resistance though.
*'''Giant Slayers''': These are just super Slayers, too costly to run a lot of. They will instantly blend light cavalry units like Marauder Horsemen or Ellyrian Reavers that dare to charge them, not that you should be using them to counter these units, it's just funny to see happen. Giant Slayers are basically Ungrim Ironfist as many Dwarfs instead of one. What they don't kill will be pretty close to death. Cannon fodder might counter Slayers, but Giant Slayers dish out enough melee damage that you only need to worry about elite infantry and high mass units charging them. More vulnerable to shooting as they don't get the missile defense that Slayers get, these guys are expensive but do the job. Not recommended as a staple unit in army builds due to their cost, but good to pick if you're against monster or cavalry heavy armies.
*'''Hammerers''': Your well-armored, AP Damage dealing elite Dwarfs, not the same tank as a Longbeard but will deal serious AP damage. They've been reworked in the latest game, giving them substantially more health and magical(!) damage, meaning they're your best chance against Daemons and Treekin. **Still the same weaknesses as before, though: they're a Hammer (heh) in an Army of Anvils, so they'll mostly be pushing their way through your infantry
**Peak Gate Guard(ROR): The ultimate anti-armor unit, they go through heavily armored units like swordsmen through Skavenslaves and then let other Dawi also participate in the fun.

===Ranged Infantry===
*'''Thunderers''': Like Empire Handgunners, but you don't need to babysit them as much. A very useful unit even in the lategame that won't break the bank.
*'''Irondrakes:''' Where the fun begins. Ridiculously high damage output, solidly armoured. Need positioning to work right, but will absolutely demolish anything that you point them at. Their flamethrowers are considered artillery so they cannot be blocked by shields and inflict morale penalty upon anything they hit. They are surprisingly strong in melee against infantry if not deployed in a thin line because the back row can use their flamethrowers at point-blank, but not against cavalry as they'll pierce till the back row.
**'''The Skolder Guard'''(ROR): Replaces Lava for Steam to be an anti-armor unit. Much tougher than an Irondrakes with Physical resistance which is nice to have when the enemy gets a sneaky charge. They will multch full-plate units quickly given they have an even faster reload speed but watch out as you will also burn through their limited ammunition just as quickly. Against enemies with less armor you're better off using regular Irondrakes.
*'''Irondrakes (Trollhammer Torpedo)''': the Anti large version of the Irondrakes, having rocket launchers instead of Flamers. Often times Irondrakes can just melt through the armor of most things they are pointed at, sometimes they are Cavalry or monsters that have enough armor to shrug off that current of magma. Unlike regular Irondrakes they can shoot over units and obstacles. Don't be fooled by how their torpedoes explode, they don't do splash damage and should only attack infantry if you don't have anything bigger to shoot.

===Combined Infantry===
*'''Quarrellers''': Boring but practical. Like dwarf warriors, they're able to trade shots with the tier 1 ranged units of pretty much every other faction and winning because they come with shields on top of their dwarf armor. They also come with armor piercing, which makes them a budget option for shooting stuff like chaos warriors. However, they do less DPS per gold spent than similar units like empire crossbowmen and darkshards.
**As mentioned above, Thorek brings out the best in these guys, keeping them very relevant even to the late game. The shield variant is best used against missile-heavy factions like Wood Elves, but does nothing against Artillery.
*'''Quarrellers (Great Weapons)''': Similar to Quarrelers, except they give up shields in exchange for armor-piercing melee weapons. Won't win much in close combat, but they'll take down more enemies before they're overwhelmed, particularly against squishy units like harpies.
**Thorek buffs them to an insane degree to the point that when combined with all the relevant campaign bonuses, Quarrelers will become the core of your army. They're still not a frontline since they only have so many models in a unit, but 6-10 of these guys can outright delete anything that gives your Longbeards and Ironbreakers a hard time (Mammoths, stonehorns, even Rogue Idols). They also autoresolve very well, taking more losses than the shielded variant, but will take less losses than your frontline infantry.
*'''Miners (Blasting Charges)''': take that Cheap miner, then give them a single volley for bomb-throwing. Each model only gets one bomb, so make it count. Turn off ''Fire at Will'' and select the targets manually. A well-thrown Blasting Charge will decimate most charging infantry.
**'''Ekrund Miners'''(ROR): A regiment that Gets 3 Blasting Charges instead of 1. Depending on how well you managed them, that's paying less gold then recruiting 3 Blasting Charge Miners which matter very much in the gold restricted multiplayer.
*'''Ironbreakers''': The fact that Ironbreakers are one of the toughest units in the game would make them a key part of a Dawi late game army. Add to that blasting charges and you have something which can stomp most other infantry into the ground, blowing away a quarter of their hitpoints and ruining their charge before finishing off the survivors. Their only downside is that their damage in hand to hand is not that great, but that's what thunderers, slayers and artillery is for. NEVER let artillery, including artillery towers, target them. They're so slow they're target practice and they're no.1 priority as dwarfs don't have anything bigger.
**'''Norgrimlings Ironbreakers''':(ROR) Even better Ironbreakers, With bigger model size (so more bombes and unit health), a faster throwing arm, Vanguard, and Immune to Psychology. Overall a more powerful unit that can holds back the hords for longer while dealing more casualties.
*'''Rangers''': Sneaky Dwarf Quarrellers getting Vanguard and Stalk for a surprise Dwarf ambush. They have better speed to help with positioning and catching enemies at least when compared to other Dawi. They're armour is pretty good for most armies, but among Dwarfs they're on the lower end of defenses.
*'''Rangers (Great Weapons)''': Ranger equivalent of Quarrellers(Great Weapons) with one key difference; unlike the great weapon Quarreler the Rangers give up their crossbows entirely in favor of shorter ranged, higher AP throwing axes. Surprise AP flanking is a thing any Dwarf list could ask for. Keep in mind that each dwarf only carries 8 axes, so they'll run out much quicker than other rangers. Once they run out of throwing axes they become a decent anti-armour skirmishing unit, although their low defense means they need to chose their opponents carefully.
**'''Ulthar's Raiders'''(ROR) a unit your should be more careful with than just normal Rangers with Great Weapons, as they get the [[Witch Hunter]]'s ability to Mark a unit for death. You do get a fair amount of range despite having only infantry speed, being able to strip an enemy of a lot of their protection they had against ranged weapons. Good take if your using a Focus fire strategy, assuming your can keep the Raiders safe while making back their cost.
*'''Bugman's Rangers''' Surprisingly not a ROR. Improved Rangers, having the regenerative and drunkenness properties of Bugman's liquid courage. they are better at fighting off harassers while their improved shooting and HP recovery help them win archer fights. These are to Rangers as Longbeards are to Warriors: a straight upgrade assuming you can afford it. In MP, they can last longer without support and work best if you're good at micro. If not, you're probably better just leaving them at home in favor of more units of regular rangers.

===Cavalry===
Does not exist. See Slayers, Rangers and Air Units if you want something fast, you beardling.

===Artillery===
*'''Bolt Thrower:''' Your cheaper anti-large Artillery. More accurate and shoots faster than a cannon, but outclassed by them in splash and penetration power. Best used to take out elite cavalry and monsters in the early campaign.
*'''Grudge Thrower''': Your first artillery unit. Fills a role like an Empire Mortar as a long-range anti-infantry weapon giving it has the largest radius of splash damage on impact.
**'''Gob-Lobber (Grudge Thrower)(ROR)''': Like the Grudge Thrower, but better. Also has live Goblins bolted to the projectiles. Causes morale penalties to targets, which stacks with the penalty for being hit by artillery.
*'''Cannon:''' Your classic artillery. Slow to fire but harder to dodge, best used as an Anti-large weapon while also killing models in high armor units, through can have difficulties hitting if the enemy zigzags too much like most Artillery units.
*'''Organ Gun:''' An effective horse begone tool, with good armor piercing and a ton of cannon balls flying everywhere, cavalry will quickly and efficiently die off in droves as your foe rages, if there’s no cav to shoot, then this thing is good for pulping infantry and can do a decent job at eliminating chariots.
*'''Flame Cannon''' Jack-of-all-trades artillery. Great area damage to deal with blobs of infantry and while it doesn't cause AP damage, its base damage is high enough that it doesn't matter. Funny enough, its stats make it much better at breaking towers and walls than cannons.

===Air Units===
The closest thing to "cavalry". Flying Bombers. Fill a role as the fast-moving guns to shoot at enemy flanks and drop anti-infantry bombs. The rotor blades can also dish out a good amount of melee damage, but having almost no melee defense makes them relatively fragile despite having high armor. They are often safe in the air, but keep them away from other flyers and AP missiles. Despite this, they are absurdly fast having speed in the 200s to run from most problems (only Pegasus Knights or Hawk Riders could catch them without nets or debuffs). To use effectively will require some mico.

*'''Gyrobomber:''' Your dedicated bomber which sacrifices other aspects to be the best at that. As a single mobile unit dedicated to hovering over infantry to drop annihilating bombs multiple times during a game, they obviously require the most micromanagement. A well placed carpet bombing can absolutely devastate the enemy frontline, and its machine gun can put out Ratling-Gun levels of DPS on a much more mobile platform.
Important to note that on small unit scale, the gyrobombers bombs are not reduced in damage, so one gyrobomber becomes an army-shredding machine on that unit scale, and putting 2-3 or even more in every army will be an auto-win for the campaign
**'''Skyhammer(ROR)''': Drops cluster bombs, so be aware that the damage-area is greater than the marker shows. Basically the Dwarfs answer to big aoe magic to obliterate chaff and elite units alike.
*'''Gyrocopter:''' Your anti-infantry skirmishers, shooting and bombing out those enemy gunners and artillery that thought themselves safe so far in the back. Also good at harassing the harassers that thought they could run a circle around the slowly pivoting Dawi gun lines.
*'''Gyrocopter (Brimstone Gun):''' Switches from general anti-infantry to majority AP damage to harass and focus down targets with more armor. Generally speaking, superior in almost every way to regular Gyrocopters. Fire damage puts a serious dent in units with regeneration (and Wood Elves) and the lower base damage is neglible when you take AP into consideration.

==Tactics==
===Multiplayer Strategies===
Dwarfs are one of the most unique factions in the game battle wise, with an utter lack of mobility and magick, and focusing everything on tanky infantry that can deal decent damage, and powerful guns and artillery. Unfortunately for them, this uniqueness means that unless you're fighting other Dwarfs, you don't have any balanced match ups against other races. Against some you have a clear, obvious advantage and tend to stomp, and against others, they give you swirlies in the bathroom for your lunch money. This is why most competitive players think they're one of the best counterpick factions as you can avoid your bad match ups and play in a favorable situation. Anyway, here's how you can satisfy the grudge against the other races:

*'''Beastmen''': A rush faction, Beastmen will have a hell of a time against you, if you play your cards right. Their complete lack of armor leaves them quite vulnerable to Thunderer fire on the approach and Bolt Throwers can slice through Minotaurs and Cygors with relative ease. Keep a solid screen of staunch Dwarf Warriors between your ranged units and the enemy and bring (Giant) Slayers to turn the Bestigor and Centigor Herds into ground beef.

*'''Bretonnia''': The peasantry of the Bretonnians can safely be ignored (except Foot Squires, after their buffs they can actually fuck you up pretty good), as they'll struggle to do anything to your heavy armor. Instead, you'll want to focus on bringing down their armored cavalry, particularly the Grail Knights and Grail Guardians leading the charges into you. Trollhammer Irondrakes serve fantastically as a powerful Horse-B-Gone tool and your Giant Slayers can chunk through most of their cavalry so long as they're not the ones receiving the initial charge. Bolt Throwers are, again, a powerful tool to use while the Bretonnian cav is on the approach. Just make sure that you keep your flanks thoroughly secure.

*'''[[Total_War_Warhammer/Tactics/Chaos_Dwarfs| Chaos Dwarfs]]''': Here's the thing about the Dawi-Zharr: their Dwarf units are generally better than yours one-on-one but are far more expensive. You can fill the field with heavily armored and relatively cheap infantry while they have to fill it with greenskin slaves.As a result your army as a whole has better staying power than theirs. Your Thunderers in particular are much cheaper than Fireglaives and have better range than Blunderbusses. Chaos Dwarf artillery can pose a big problem as you are pretty stationary and that's what they love but your cannons get a lot more shots per unit than theirs do and if you play your cards right you can win artillery duels. Watch out for Magma Cannons however, as the burning vortex their shots leave behind can really mess up an artillery crew - focus them down first if possible. Chaos Dwarfs also have lots of big monsters and chariots which will be a problem for you just as they always are. Your best bet is to shoot them down ASAP and if all else fails have a few Slayers in reserve. Gryrobombers can do pretty good against clumped Chaos Dwarf elite infantry and have a place in this matchup.

*'''Daemons of Chaos''': Expect Khorne Furies and a mostly Slaanesh-roster. see Slaanesh's guide below on how to deal with this. The good news is that since daemons of Chaos don't have access to greater daemon lords, you 'might' be able to deal with their hero-class lords. But this is mostly a full pain matchup for you, due to the access to the Slaanesh-roster daemons have.

*'''Chaos Warriors''': For Grungni's sake, keep your distance! Chaos Warriors are as tough as you are and hit harder in melee. Stock up on Thunderers and cannons, and bring some great weapon fighters to finish them off. Slayers can help as long as you're careful to make sure the enemy can't hit back. Keep your eyes out for flanking cavalry and chariots, and pray to the gods you can shoot those heathens before they reach your lines!

*'''Dark Elves''': This is a really tricky matchup for you; Dark Elves are fast and bring absurd AP damage in melee and at a range. Your biggest advantage is your superior range and you'll need to lean on it heavily to stand a chance. Grab cannons, Grudge Throwers, Rangers, and Quarrelers and hope to Grungi you can shoot them down before they get close enough to return the favor.

*'''Dwarfs''': Hopefully you have a general idea on the strengths of this faction, you're playing as them! Anti-Armor, full stop. Organ Guns, take the Skolder Guard and bring some Hammerers to crack open your opponent's can.

*'''Empire''': The Empire can be a tricky one because they're almost as good at artillery as you are while also having good cavalry and skirmishers. You'll need to stock up on gyrobombers to disrupt their flanking cavalry and Slayers to take out their knights. Irondrakes can also work well at deleting any aggressive demigryphs or knights. Beyond that, you should double down on your strengths and keep your artillery safe; the human lines will break before yours do.

*'''Greenskins''': As satisfying as it is to bury an axe in a greenskins skull, you are better off dealing with these guys from a distance. Quarrelers and Rangers are your friends here; quantity is as important as quality when fending off a green tide. Organ Guns and Cannons will be better at dealing with monsters than your Slayers, you don't want to send unarmoured units against Arachnarok Spiders or Rogue Idols. Don't forget your Irondrakes and/or your flame cannons, they can melt down anything from goblins to stone trolls. And keep your flanks protected from chariots and pump-wagons, they can wreak havoc on your lines and just ruin your day.

*'''Grand Cathay''': This is another instance of a faction that does what you do, only a hell of a lot worse. Yeah, you won't have to worry too much about these guys when they show up. Your missile boxes beat their missile boxes, their Cav is subpar and will get eaten by Slayers, and the only AP infantry that they have is Anti Large, which you don't have. Box up, get some cannons and Quarrelers, sit back and enjoy some Bugmans as the Cathayans desperately try to figure out how the fuck they're getting into your backline. Yes they do have their own little airforce, but do you really think Umgi inventions can compete with Dawi Gyrocopters? No. If they bring Sky Junks, send some Gyrocopters after them to pick them down. This faction might get more scary as DLC comes out, but for now this should be an easy win as long as you know what you're doing.

*'''High Elves''': Don't let the War of the Beard fool you, this will be one of your hardest match ups. High Elves have a lot of things that threaten you, but the things to fear the most would be their Chariots, Mages, White Lions and <s>Sisters of Averlorn</s> (they do magic damage so their AP isn't as useful as you think). Seriously, any High Elf player who knows what they're doing is going to spam White Lions and it is going to SUCK. Your best bet is to spam either Gyrocopters or Cannons and spread the field. Force the High Elves to have to either attack your artillery emplacements one at a time, allowing your others to fire freely, or use your air power and artillery to spread them apart and pick off pockets. Hammerers also have a niche in this match up, because they beat White Lions pretty hard one-on-one and with support from guns or chaff, they can go toe to toe with Swordmasters (Though don't count on that). Of course, these plans aren't perfect. There's a 99% chance they will bring Alarielle for Tempest and heals to deal with Gyros and they have plenty of mobility to get at your cannons to give the White Lions time to get in. Sadly, this is one of those match ups where even if you bring the most optimized Anti Elgi list possible, there's still a pretty decent chance you'll lose. Avoid this match up if you can.

*'''Khorne''': It's Khorne, c'mon. Warriors of chaos with somehow even less ranged and even killier once they reach your front lines. Bring plenty of armor-piercing infantry and ranged. If you want to live, protect your artillery from Khorne's furies and calvary.

*'''Kislev''': Kislev's big weakness is that their ranged firepower is also their melee power due to hybrid units, and while this seems great at first glance, they sacrifice both elements to have the other. Your artillery and ranged firepower will dump all over Kislev, your biggest concern are War Bears and Sleds, to which you should apply Slayers. Focus down the wizards and you'll out-brutalize Kislev in good time.

*'''Lizardmen''': Lizardmen are a bit of a mixed bag. On one hand, you can scoff at all the Skinks as they ping impotently off of your armor (unless they're the Red-Crested variety). On the other, Saurus are just as stubborn as you are and will take days to chew through without good AP. Bring some Hammerers to eek out an advantage in the inevitable grindfest you'll end up in. Take advantage of the Lizardmen's dearth of ranged firepower and massacre their forces with Irondrakes and Thunderers, while your Dwarf Warriors hold their front line at bay. You have excellent anti-monster units in the form of your Giant Slayers who absolutely will butcher any big dinosaur thrown into your ranks so long as you have some chaff to help trap and soak the damage the beasties can toss about. Though Skinks will largely prove a minor nuisance at best to a majority of your forces, you will ''definitely'' want to screen your (Giant) Slayers from the Skirmishing variety. Key players to watch out for are going to be the Slann Mage-Priests, Skink Priests and Kroxigors. Slann, especially fire/high Slann and Heavens Skink Priests can wreak utter havoc upon your forces with the myriad of vortex spells they can toss out, like candy from a parade float and they should absolutely be prioritized if you find them on the field. (Sacred) Kroxigors, if fielded, are surprisingly vicious anti-infantry monsters and will bowl over a majority of the infantry they're pointed at. Giant Slayers and Trollhammer Irondrakes serve as a solid counter, but you'll still want to swamp the Kroxigors in chaff to mitigate the damage they deal in turn.

*'''Norsca''': This is an easy fight for you. All of that monster hunting anti-large equipment the Norscans bring is going to fly right over your head as you bury your axes in their unarmoured pecs. Bring plenty of Cannons and Bolt Throwers to shoot down enemy Mammoths and bring some Irondrakes to shoot down anything else. Norscans are usually unarmoured, so you can trade your Thunderers for Quarrelers for the better range. Stick to the basics and you'll do fine.

*'''Nurgle''': Holy shit, a faction that might actually be slower than you! And it seems like you will have a hefty advantage as they don't really have a lot of ways to stop your artillery. The biggest thing you will probably have to worry about is their air force, and Furies and Rotflies will be gunning for that back line. Keep some Slayers near your guns, and get ready to surround them if they try to land. After that you just got to deal with Nurgle's rush of Plaguebearers and Nurglings, and I hope you're ready for nothing to ever die ever because that's likely what is gonna happen when Dawi and Nurgle clash. On the ground, Plague Toads and Pox Riders will likely be your biggest threat with their anti-infantry, but they're also big models, so guns and Slayers should do the trick. Expect a Herald as the commander, and if he's dumb enough to bring a Great Unclean One, laugh and shoot it to pieces. With the new debuffs fire damage does to healing, it might also be wise to break out the Irondrakes and Flame Cannons -- you'll have plenty of time to lob napalm at those shambling hordes of Plaguebearers.
** CoC DLC has brought some changes with access to marked WoC units for Nurgle; the units you will definitely see in this match-up now include Nurgle-marked Chaos Knights, Nurgle-marked Chaos Chariots, Nurgle-marked Chaos Warriors/Chosen with Great Weapons and Nurgle Marauder Horsemen with throwing axes. Knights & Chariots are especially a threat, as they will survive long enough from their speed+armour+Nurgle Mark to get behind your lines and wipe artillery or rear-charge your line infantry. Great weapon Warriors/Chosen, while still vulnerable to your guns when getting to your lines, are both units that have respectable chances of beating your units in the grind with their standard WoC stats, but now plus the Nurgle Mark. The Nurgle Warshrine is a strong support piece for the army, but like a GUO its something Dwarfs can delete so easily that you really should not see it. Generally expect Nurgle armies facing you to have a decent share of Nurgle-marked Mortal units from WoC now, unless your opponent hates themselves.

*'''Ogre Kingdoms''': This match is either gonna be your easiest or your hardest, as this comes down to the skill of you, the Ogre player, and what units you brought to the table. The Ogres have massive charge bonuses, but a lot of your units have charge defense, however unlike other factions, the Ogres will only lose half due to their Ogre Charge trait. The biggest threat the Ogres bring to you is their artillery, and if you leave them be they'll reap a devasting toll on your infantry. The good news is, that with the exception of Leadbelchers, all their artillery are a single model. Have your Cannons and Gyrocopters focus them down and you are good to go, or so you would think. Besides the Gnoblars, Ogres are all monster units, which means two things. One is that your artillery and Slayers will have a field day, but two is that their shockingly fast speed means they're gonna out run you and try to outmaneuver you at every opportunity. Your army should be a good balance of Longbeards, or if you are pinching pennies, Dwarf Warriors, they all have charge defense and can help hold the charging balls of lubber back. This is one of the match up where having a ton of Slayers is a good thing, and stack up on them to defend your back lines and cut the Ogres down to size. Your artillery should consist of two, maybe three Cannons to take out artillery and thin their numbers. Irondrakes with Trollhammer Torpedoes won't be a bad call, but they're on the pricey end. Besides some of their units, bring at least two, or simply one unit of Thunderers at most, because a lot of their stuff is unarmored, your main missile troop should be Quarrelers, they're cheap and will have a good time turning Ogres into pin-cushions and are strong enough to fend off Sabertusks. Your artillerys targeting priority should look something like this: artillery units (Ironblasters first, then Leadbelchers), Stonehorns, and finally, everything else. This should be the only match up where you shouldn't bother bringing Miners with Blasting Charges. The only thing they'll have an effect on is Gnoblars and strictly that, which is a waste of cash and will earn you a grudge for being wasteful. Now get out there and strike out some grudges agaisnt the fat bastards!

*'''Skaven''': This is probably the closest we'll get to a 40k-esque matchup (you know, <strike>aside the irony of neither the [[Squats|Dwarfs]] or Skaven being in that setting</strike> [[Leagues of Votann|The Kin has declared a Grudge against the manling who wrote that]]). Between your guns and artillery and their guns and artillery, most of the damage either of you will be dealing to each other will be done from afar. A majority of the Skaven infantry is quite helpless against your frontline infantry, but you'll have a hell of a time pinning anything down with the Skavens quicker movement speeds. Grudge Throwers are going to be king against most Skaven infantry builds, while Bolt Throwers or Cannons should be fielded to snipe any Warp-Lighting Cannons, Plagueclaw Catapults or Hellpit Abominations they have downfield. Warplock Jezzails will be a priority target to focus fire down, as are Warpfire Throwers and Poison Wind Globadiers, should they start getting too close. Aside utilizing their missile units against them, Skaven have absolutely no aerial presence, meaning your Gyrocopters will have virtually free reign to gun down rats at will.

*'''Slaanesh''': A bad day for you all around. It's become apparent, that if you're unlucky enough to run into Slaanesh, you're going to want to forego ranged firepower almost entirely, Miners with Blasting Charges and Ironbreakers will trade efficiently, maybe a safety pick of Thunderers to deal with a Keeper Of Secrets, but AP on everything, Furies, Spawn and chariots will just pulverize your formations in one of the most one-sided setups in the game right now.

*'''Tomb Kings''': The good news is that Tomb Kings don't like fire, and you have fire aplenty. Brimstone Gun-equipped Gyrocoptors are your fastest fire-delivery system, but Irondrakes and Flame Cannons are useful as well. The bad news is, that you don't like chariots, and they have chariots aplenty. Use every trick you can to soften up the chariots before they hit your lines; but it's unlikely you'll be able to stop them all. Grab some Giant Slayers to finish off the ones that survive your barrage and hope it's enough to keep them down. Tomb Kings infantry is no match for you, so you should build your army against their monsters and chariots.

*'''Tzeentch''': Ooh, here is somebody that's going to hate you. Tzeentch units are squishy and their ranged units only have middling range and are better for kiting. He also has no artillery other than Soul Grinders, few big monsters outside of Lords of Change, and relies heavily on spamming spells to activate their army abilities. Bring a Runelord or Thorek on an Anvil of Doom and laugh as their casters explode. Otherwise, pound them into dust with artillery, as they have few answers to an army with better range than them. Just guard the back line against Furies and Doom Knights and don't bother with air units, they'll get shot down in short order.

*'''Vampire Coast''': The most common Vampire Coast strategy is to bunker up with a large number of cheap ranged units and heavy artillery. If that sounds familiar, it's only because it's the same thing you like to do, you're just better at it. Bring plenty of Cannons and some Slayers to deal with the enemy monsters (hint: kill the Necrofex Colossi first). Once the big monsters have been dealt with, the pirates are basically just an inferior version of you, clumps of Quarrelers and Thunderers are plenty to take down the Zombies. And remember not to bunker up too tightly; you may have magic resistance but Winds of Death will still hurt.

*'''Vampire Counts''': Virtually nothing that makes up the rank and file of the Vampire Counts will pose a significant threat to you. Skeletons and Zombies will only serve to slow down your already plodding advance and only deal any meaningful "damage" to you simply by sponging your limited ranged firepower meant for something else. The only standard units that you'll find yourself at a significant disadvantage against will be the Cairn and Hex Wraiths, given your general lack of magical damage. You'll want to engage them with missile attacks for maximum effect and make sure that you are braced for their charges. The main thing you should be focused on taking down will be the Lords and Heroes leading the army; without them, the undead hordes will quickly fall apart (literally). They also pose the single biggest threat to everything you have, as their Lore of Death casters can delete swathes of your army with a single well placed cast if you are positioned carelessly.

*'''Wood Elves''': Wood Elves are an extremely annoying foe who are fundamentally the exact opposite of you. Their infantry can run circles around yours and they can deal frightening amounts of damage against their intended targets, but you'll snap their twiggy spines if you whip 'em with your beards. In general, you're going to be engaged in a very tedious game of "keep away", where the Wood Elves are going to be dancing just outside of your reach while their Glade Guard and Waywatchers pepper you with AP arrows and occasionally test your flanks for weaknesses via Wild Rider/Great Stag Knight cycle charges. Fortunately, you do have a couple tools the elves don't: Artillery. Grudge Throwers excel against WE infantry and can discourage them from trying to camp too far away, while Bolt Throwers and Flame Cannons will make mince-meat of the cavalry/Forest Spirits that may try to break through your lines. Speaking of Forest Spirits, Irondrakes will ''incinerate'' them. Slayers also help against the bigger tree spirits in theory, but the ranged power the Wood Elves bring make them a dicey proposition. As far as their melee infantry options are concerned, the only ones that majorly threaten you are the Bladesingers; their anti-armor magical attacks will scythe through your armor will jaw-dropping speed. Use Thunderers to soften them up on the charge then use Slayers to cut them down swiftly.

===Domination===
General Tier Rank: '''F'''

You are just SO FUCKING SLOW. You opponent is going to get to the point first, no question about it and most armies have plenty of ways to roadblock you in order to stop you from getting on them. While few factions will be able to contest you in a head on charge for the midpoint, once they start going for the side points you will have no way to out contest them. Important to note that there are some maps that you won't get completely dumpstered automatically. The more choke points that are on a map, the better it is for you because then the enemy will be more forced to try to take you head on instead of just avoid direct contact with you in an attempt to cap more points. However, even then there's no way you can outmaneuver your enemy unless they fall asleep at their computer out of boredom. Don't play Dwarfs in Domination until they get some major buffs, a DLC, or rework that will help them move around the map better.

However if you still decide to stay committed to playing dwarfs, the general tip is seize two caps at least and have a squadron of gyrocopters and bombers to harass the foe, ironbreakers are king here, jam them on a point and laugh as your opponent struggles to get them off, rangers and miners are key here as they are the only units with vanguard deployment (this includes the ROR ironbreakers) to delay the foe by brawling with them as your slower units get into position or to reinforce your troops if needed, slayers are necessary here as besides gyrocopters, their the fastest thing you got, bring along 3, 4 if needed, to both delete cav or monsters too big for their britches and do aforementioned delaying tactics, for artillery, on smaller maps, organ guns and flame cannons will be an excellent infantry/cavalry begone tool for clearing out points that are infested with enemy troops, as per the norm, bring a cannon to deal with enemy artillery and snipe monsters regardless of the map size, on longer maps, the grudge-thrower will be a much better alternative for clearing out points, but organ guns and flame cannons are a good deterrent for defending points, as they’ll delete blobs, just make sure there safe from enemy cav and flyers, however the one weakness as listed above, is your slowness, you need to be smart if you want to consistently win domination as dwarfs, assume a box formation as units in said shape, turn about faster and thus let them react to threats flanking around or move to different points faster if it’s necessary (keep in mind, it does not increase movement speed, it just hastens how fast they turn), while it is vulnerable to artillery fire, your cannons should already be firing at said artillery, follow this guide somewhat well and proceed to wipe every smug grin off with an axe, show every YouTuber good or otherwise how wrong they were as you strike out grudges and get vengeance for every domination tier list that put you in F tier!

===Campaign Strategies===
*'''Karaz-A-Karak''': Karaz-A-Karak starts out with a solid base economy and a protected position, with your flanks covered by minor dwarven factions and only one Greenskin faction as your initial enemy. However, that start is deceivingly simple at first; once Grimgor and Queek get going, your position will become increasingly precarious if you're not careful. Your biggest weakness is easily your very slow growth, as the Greenskins and Skaven often will have higher tier units much sooner than you do. Making the jump from Tier 3 to 4 as soon as you can is your top priority. Once your scary lategame units arrive, you can start to dominate the Southlands and expand in any direction you damn please.
**'''Pick Gronbrimdal (Mortal Empires only)''': There is no reason to ever pick Thorgim over Grombrindal as your starting LL. Grombrindal comes with a much better selection of starting units (Gyrocopters, Irondrakes and Thunderers) and his blue skill tree might be one of the most blatantly overpowered things in the game on its own, as Grombrindals variants of the perks not just affect his army, but your entire faction. Thorgrim can be recruited later down the line regardless.
**'''Don't get bogged down''': The initial 50 turns of any campaign might just be called "get ready for Grimgor". While you can expand quickly at the start, it is ill advised (and very tempting) to stray too far from your Capital and end up with your armies battering against your starting enemies while Grimgor happily carves a path straight towards Karaz-A-Karak. Losing Karaz-A-Karak becomes a win condition in this case; if you can successfully defend it, the Greenskins are finished, if you lose it, you can restart a new campaign.

'

*Clan Angrund''' In immortal empires Belegar's difficulty level has been severely reduced, on turn one as soon as you take your first settlement you can full-confederate Karak Izor instantly. After that it's the usual hop and skip to Karak-Eight-Peaks, however with it in Skarsnik's hands now, it's significantly easier to take as Skarsnik doesn't start with a full 20 stack army unlike the 'Crooked Moon Mutineers' from Warhammer 2.
[[Category:Total Warhammer]] {{Total War Warhammer Tactics}}

Total War Warhammer/Tactics/Dwarfs

2023-06-12T18:09:39Z

2A02:1810:4E2C:A900:DC0E:597F:F427:CBEB: /* Infantry */

{{Topquote|Kazukhan-kazakit-ha! (Look out, the Dwarfs are on the warpath!)|Game battle chant for Dwarfs, if you think about it, it should be look <s>down</s> THAT'S A GRUDGE!}}
This is the tactics page for the Total War: Warhammer version of The Dwarfs.

==Why play Dwarfs?==
*Because you want to sit and watch as your enemies are blasted away while coming towards you.
*Cause you're under 5'5 and want '''vengeance''' for all the short jokes.
*You don't want to do too much micro, so an army without much in the way of mobility and cavalry doesn't bother you as much.
*You enjoy having infantry that won't die after being slapped by a wet noodle.
*Slay everything without a beard!!
*FLAMETHROWERS!!!

===Pros===
*'''Durability''': You are a tank faction. Most of your units are categorized with high armour, melee defense and leadership. Even your tier one and chaff are very tanky compared to counterparts from other factions. This is further supplemented by the innate magic resist many of your units have, which ''slightly'' compensates for your otherwise complete lack of magic. Additionally, with their naturally high leadership, dwarfs do not usually break unless hopelessly outnumbered or if you screw up massively by getting cavalry charged in the rear. Frankly, your units will hold out forever.
**Your magic resistance got nerfed in the third game to ''only'' resist magical spells. Still useful, but now units with magic attacks, I.E Daemons, are going to be way better at cracking you open.
*'''Range''': Guns, guns and more guns! Dwarfs have some of the best blackpowder units in the entire game. Thunderers and Cannons can lay a whooping on anything they are firing on, and their artillery isn't anything to sneer at. Even their non-AP range units are very good for their price, and it's not hard for them to earn their points back as long as they are defended.
*'''If they get close, Nut 'em!''': As if being being one of the best factions at shooting was not enough, their missile units can also hold their own in close quarters better than most.
*'''Airforce''': Gyrocopters with their anti large can get you control over the air, and their ability to kite monsters into oblivion is a good skill to have. Even Gyrobombers have a niche for their blob killing capabilities after recent buffs.
*'''Runes''': Where other races rely on the fickle Winds of Magic, you have your reliable runes. Runes supply surprisingly good buffs and debuffs that can help your army out, making them a great way to make sure your infantry stays in the fight a bit longer. The fact that they aren't limited by a power reserve also means that they'll remain a viable option well into the latter stages of a fight, where other factions might begin to tap out of their mystical power.
*'''Anti-large''': You laugh when the enemy brings big monsters. With all your AP missiles, Anti Large artillery and slayers, you have the one of the easiest times killing monsters out of any faction in the game.
*'''Strong Economy''': It's campaign specific but yeah, it turns out the species who's renowned for being the best at making shit is also one of the best at making money. The resource building chains go up to level IV instead of stopping at level III, you can mass produce Dwarf Beer anywhere. Putting together Doomstacks of Top Tier Dawi troops is easier.
*'''Good for Beginners''': Everyone was just starting once, if you are new to Warhammer Total War or just Total War in general the Dawi are (ironically enough) forgiving. Something like the Wood Elves is fragile and has a limited margin for error, Dwarfs on the other hand have more of a fudge factor in most match ups. Not to say that it's easy mode playing dwarfs, but the likelihood of things going pear shaped in a second is lower.

===Cons===
*'''Lack of Mobility''': With no Cav, monsters and slow infantry, Dwarfs are the least mobile faction in the game. You will spend the majority of the game standing still.
*'''Lack of Magic''': Though your most recent rework makes your runes a damn good alternative, you don't really have magic. This can pose a problem when you face similarly physically durable armies in battle and lack a reliable, magical alternative for damage. Additionally, though you defensively have a 25% resistance to the arcane, many large vortex spells will still sting quite a bit and your complete lack of magical healing means it'll be hard to bounce back from the damage you do take.
*'''Chariots''': Chariots are the bane of a Dwarf players existence. They don't have any real way to lock them down and, as you'd expect, AP anti infantry can really kill what the Dwarfs want to do on the battlefield. Due to the rework to how bracing and knock down works, this isn’t as bad as before, but chariots can still be a problem
*'''Predictability''': Most veteran players know what's going to happen when Dwarfs are picked. They are going to go for a cheap, numerous and sturdy front line and a lot of guns and artillery. This means that Dwarfs are easy to plan for as they only have one real viable tactic. Building an army around fighting Dwarfs is something players from all races know how to do.
*'''Lack of Good Lord Options''': Do you like the Runelord or Thorek? No? Well you better start because in multiplayer they're your only viable options. Grombrindal is an ok duelist but honestly Dwarf lords in general kind of suck. With no mounts and no way to stick to their targets it's hard for them to get anything done. This problem got better with the Twisted and the Twilight due to the changes to knockdown effects, but sticking to targets will still be hard
*'''Hard campaign''': With all the changes to the factions around them, the Dawi have fallen on some pretty hard times. The lifetime of WH2 dotted the landscape around Karaz-A-Karak alone with a huge number of guaranteed enemies that you will have to look out for, with your most reliable allies in the Empire being very far away. The other subfactions don't fare much better and your slow growth seriously hurts your ability to expand, especially when compared with your most dominant enemies, the Greenskins of the Badlands and Clan Mors further down the road.
*'''Bad in Domination''': Turns out your stubby little legs makes it really hard for you to capture objectives. Due to your lack of mobility you can't effectively capture points since other factions can just out race you to them and get more units on them. As such, you're widely considered the weakest faction in Domination.
*'''DLC''': A con for everyone, but fortunately you get off easier than many others. Unfortunately, a couple of your best units, namely Runelords and Rangers, are in fact locked behind DLC and if you want to really use your Dwarfs to the fullest, you'll need to pay the toll.

==Universal Traits==

*'''The Great Book of Grudges''': The fact that the sacred Dammaz Kron went unmentioned on this pages for so long merits an entry on its own. The Book of Grudges documents every slight committed against your faction, including legendary grudges that you start out with. Whenever something bad happens, i.e. you lose a settlement, get raided or a hostile faction repeatedly trespasses on your turf without you allowing it, it merits an entry in the book. These entries can (and will) accumulate over time, and depending on how much your Dorfs disliked the transgression, will vary in severity, which fills up a meter that gives you some penalties and some bonusses. High severity from unresolved Grudges gives you minor public order and research speed penalties, but it also gives all of your armies a charge bonus (since the Dwarfs are so pissed off) and increases the chance of Slayers and Giant Slayers popping up in your Regiments of Renown pool, where they can then be recruited instantly into your armies. Resolving Grudges and Legendary Grudges (such as retaking Karak Eight Peaks as Belegar Ironhammer) also earns you powerful bonusses (money, Oathgold, small buffs for the entire faction ) and special Runes.
*'''Oathgold''': The secondary resource of the Dwarfs. Practically identical to the Mortuary Cult of the Tomb Kings, with the key difference being that the Dwarfs can make much more stuff with Oathgold and that the stuff is much more abundant. Oathgold is earned through resolving Grudges, doing missions and quests, Gold Mines and some special buildings such as the Brightstone Mine in Mount Gunbad. Oathgold, combined with trade goods, can be used to create items for your Lords and Heroes, which makes it downright trivial to kit out every single character on the map with some special gizmos to make them really powerful. Oathgold can also be used to make Character and Banner Runes, the former can be applied as equipment to individual characters (with up to 3 individual runes at maximum), the latter functions like Banners that you can give units to give them special bonusses and abilities.
*'''Expert Charge Defense''': Barring Slayers, every single one of your units has Expert Charge Defense, which nullifies charge bonusses and also the momentum of units charging into your staunch line of angry Dwarfs.
*'''Magic Resistance''': Every Dwarf has a built in 25% Magic Resist (Spell Resist in WH3). Consult the main page for WHFB Dwarfs as to why.

==Legendary Lords and Subfactions==
*'''Thorgrim Grudgebearer:''' The high king himself, and the only large non-war machine unit in your roster, as he is carried on a massive throne sled by some burly dwarfs, Thorgrim isn't huge on offence, better than say mid-tier combat lords, but he's mostly just a hard to kill brick of leadership. Dwarfs in range of him just become slightly harder to break, which isn't saying much given their default morale, and he's not easily sniped. This results in him being kind of underwhelming, you know he's not going to die like a bitch, but you also know that he's not exactly going to recoup even a quarter of his cost. Is kind of safe in campaign play for beginners, but Grombrindal is overall superior. - Pass.
*'''Ungrim Ironfist:''' The Slayer King, bane of anything taller than six feet, Ungrim is the opposite of Thorgrim; all offence, with low defence. Ungrim is actually pretty good in terms of being a hero-killer and monster-hunter, he's not going to solo Tyrion or Kroq-Gar, and don't even think of monster lords like Kholek or monstrous mounts such as a Tomb King on a War Sphinx, without a unit to bog them down. The problem with Ungrim is that while he can throw hands and live up to his title, he eats a lot of damage for a Dwarf, or just in general for a combat Lord, he's easy to snipe with massed missiles if caught in the open, and while he can butcher most things sent his way, he'll only be able to do this once or twice in a battle before he's at serious risk of dying. Don't let that 120 armour & Unbreakable make you think he's a tank, Ungrim's Melee Defence is quite low for a combat lord, and that low dwarf speed means he can by kited to death. Thorgrim lacks the damage to recoup his cost, Ungrim lacks the defence to recoup his costs. If playing with an ally that has access to Lore of Life he can be kept alive, but you're asking a lot of resources to support the Slayer King. - Pass.
*'''Grombrindal:''' THE WHITE DWARF, Grombrindal doesn't bring anything really special to the table, he's a decent duelist, although lacking the balls-to-the-wall offence of Ungrim Ironfist, Grombrindal is nowhere near as risky for a combat Lord. The flashbomb ability can lockdown mobile Heroes and give the White Dwarf a few easy hits. Doesn't quite bring much for the rest of the army, but is the best Legendary Lord for cost-benefit tradeoffs. He can fight, he can survive, and he can make the entire army Unbreakable with a reusable map-wide buff. - Niche but competitive in that niche. In Campaign, he is easily the best LL the Dwarfs offer. His blue skill tree affects ''your entire faction'' and the four blessings you can choose every 20 turns (10 after picking a specific skill) are all very powerful, a whopping +25% Research Rate is no joke, as are +10 Melee Attack and Defense for every unit in Grombrindals army.
*'''Belegar Ironhammer:'''(DLC) Belegar is really just a wall, he's harder to kill than Thorgrim as they have comparable stats, but he has a silver shield for 55% missile resistance. That's all. Just an insanely hard to kill Lord, sure his offence isn't terrible, being better than Thorgrim's on base stats and a nice buff can be popped to go higher. But honestly you're paying a lot for a Lord that won't die, and generally speaking Dwarfs in Total War: Warhammer aren't a faction that is centred around their generals or Heroes. No real wizards to throw high-impact spell effects, no mobile Heroes that can exploit small gaps to flank units or hunt down supporting pieces like buffers, wizards or artillery crews. The only upshot to taking Belegar's subfaction in multiplayer is getting access the Ancestor Heroes who are damned hard to kill, but are also the only Dwarf units that are scared of magic damage, which can sort of be a mind-games thing because the default assumption to seeing Clan Angrund picked is that Ancestor Heroes are on the field, so grab some magic damage to delete them, but then seeing that there are no ghost Dwarfs means that the magic damage is actually a big waste considering all Dwarfs have 25% Magic Resistance. - Pass.
*'''Thorek Ironbrow:'''(FLC): With the rework comes a new LL and Thorek serves this role, being the latest (and most likely last) new contender in the Lustrian Thunderdome in the Vortex Campaign, and starting at the southernmost tip of the map in Karak Zorn on Mortal Empires. He serves as a supercharged Runelord with access to a unique mount that messes quite a bit with enemy spellcasting and improved Runic Magic on his own part. In the campaign, his legendary conservativeness translates into bonusses for "traditional" Dwarfen ranged units like Quarrelers and Grudge Throwers. Not to worry though, since he starts with a Rune of Burning that makes the Catapult projectiles [[Awesome|FUCKING EXPLODE]] and dramatically increases the combat value of Quarrelers in his own Army quite significantly (arguably making them even better than Thunderers). His campaign goal revolves around finding several lost Dwarfen artifacts, which can then be used to craft powerful buffs for your whole faction. [[Derp|He also can make enemy casters explode.]] - Best Multiplayer Lord pick.

==Units==
===Generic Lords===
*'''Dwarf Lord:''' No, just no, he suffers from the same issue that the Legendary Lords suffer from, being too slow. But wait there's more, the generic Lord is easier to kill in combat, provides less army support, and does less damage. He's not even the cheapest option to help save costs. I mean he has a shield, but its only bronze. Unless you've got some kind of bet riding on a battle and there's a specific stipulation that you cannot use any other Lord, screw the money because he's too crap. That said compared to generic foot Lords in other factions he's quite difficult to kill, which is more advice for fighting Dwarf Lords in campaign really. PASS!
*'''Runelord:''' (DLC) Yes, yes yes. The one competitive General in multiplayer, the Runelord is just a walking bubble of passive buffs that make your low tier units good, and your good infantry units even better. Has good active abilities, like Master Rune of Oath & Steel which gives +30 armour to all dwarfs in range, or the Rune of Speed which adds 45% speed and 24 melee attack to all dwarfs in range. This is the Lord pick that supports the Dwarf army, and don't think he's some kind of wizard that dies when someone looks at him funny, while the melee defence is low at 40, the Runelord has the same 120 armour as the other Lords, plus up to 35% missile resistance, sharing 20% of that with nearby allies. Slapping him on an Anvil of Doom gives a special ability that causes enemy casters to automatically miscast for minor damage when near him. TL;DR fucks magic, gets buffs. - Good if you want Thorek but a bit cheaper.

===Legendary Heroes (Clan Angrund Only)===
[[Clan Angrund]] has such a strong relationship with their ancestors, they come back as ghosts. Like all ghosts, they have a 75% physical resistance instead of magic resistance, with magic attacks, Unbreakable, but no armor and less health than normal. They have Fear and Terror making them good at chasing the enemy off. They themselves are weak to magic attacks, but who takes that much offense magic against Dwarfs anyway?

*'''King Lunn Ironhammer:''' is one of the two ghost Thanes, being the offensive one, with slightly more Melee attack than a normal Thane.
*'''Halkenhaf Stonebeard:''' the other ghost Thane, being the most defensive of the par with significantly lower melee attack but a very high defense of 65 and silver shield, letting him minge with enemies for a protracted time to proc terror routs.
*'''Throni Ironbrow:''' Most likely to take as he is a Runesmith, so someone that needs protection while also being in the front lines.
*'''Dramar Hammerfist:''' the ghost engineer so paying extra for a harder to kill gun lines buffer and better at chasing away those that try to disrupt them.

===Heroes===
*'''Master Engineer:''' Basically a must if you're running more than 2 artillery pieces, buffs artillery, has a decent sniper rifle of his own, not great in a fight with anything beyond hound packs and light cavalry, so don't expect him to be an effective guard for the cannons he's buffing. However if there is another unit nearby casting Entrenchment right before they rout will make the unit hold the line and fight even after being routed. On campaign they also boost your army's mobility. Aaaaaand the Dwarf Rework happened, buffing him even further with the ability of the Vampirate Gunnery Wight to restore lost ammo to artillery pieces for up to five times. Just too good to miss out on if you're bringing a bunch of cannons (and who doesn't, honestly).
*'''Runesmith:''' Basically a squishier version of the Runelord, has many of the same buffs, both passive and active. With the Dwarf rework, these guys have gone from being merely decent to amazing. While utilizing a rune puts every other rune on a shared cooldown, this only applies per caster; having multiple Runesmiths allows you to stack multiple buffs simultaneously or across multiple units without having to wait out the full 60 second global cooldown. They might not necessarily be an auto-include persay, but having one or two of these guys in your army is strongly recommended.
*'''Thane:''' While they still suffer from being slow, Thanes can be used more aggressively than Legendary Lords. Kit them out with the Rune of Slowness to gimp enemy mobility, or give them the Ironbeard's Ring and coordinate with a source of fire damage: Flame Cannons, Dragonback Slayers, Warriors of Dragonfire Pass, basic Irondrakes, or Brimstone Gyrocopters, all of these will deal serious damage to units inside the debuff aura.

===Infantry===
*'''Miners''': The closest thing to cannon fodder in the Dwarf Roster, miners are cheap AP units. Also give "speed" and breadth to Dawi list by vanguarding.
*'''Dwarf Warriors''': Did you know that a unit of Dwarf Warriors costs 475 gold but can hold against 3 units of Empire Swordsmen, costing 400 gold each, for just over 2 minutes and racking up roughly 90-100 kills before dying/breaking? Dwarf Warriors aren't great, just good, and are very much just a shield wall frontline. Dwarf Warriors are very cost-effective starting units. They will trade positively against most infantry that are tier 1-3 excluding units with high AP values or anti-infantry buffs. Dwarf Warriors aren't the same as elite heavy infantry however, they will break in time, if rear charged, if attacked by great weapon units, if hit with leadership debuffs, or if attacked by characters. This is a unit that buys time for a unit in the second line to get in position to assist, do not assume you can just deploy them as a single line and have artillery sit safely behind them.
**'''Warriors of Dragonfire Pass'''(ROR): Slightly better warriors that deal fire damage in combat, not a guaranteed pick most of the time, but good against any faction that is vulnerable to fire, consider pairing with a Thane carrying Ironbeard's Ring to boost damage.
*'''Dwarf Warriors (Great Weapons)''': You know how Dwarf Warriors can hold frontlines for a time but need a second line unit to assist them, this is cheapest of the second line units. Regular warriors have shields, 40 Melee Defence, and charge defence against large units, Warriors with Great Weapons don't have those defences, they get armour piercing damage which is the kind of offence needed to make up for the vanilla Warriors' shortcomings. Don't try and use them as a frontline unit, and replace them when you can with other melee infantry.
*'''Longbeards''': Warriors +1 really, they buff the leadership of other units (it's the generic Encourage passive so no stacking with Lords), so consider mixing them with warriors. Cost-wise your mostly paying for better Melee Defence, better Leadership, the leadership aura, and Immune to Psychology compared to vanilla Warriors. A common question is which is better for cost, Longbeards or Warriors, but outside of fighting undead armies that have tons of Fear/Terror effects, the answer to the question is; use both. While the differences between the two units are obvious in comparison, to the player on the other side of the battlefield it doesn't matter much because a Dwarf line is still a solid formation that is hard to break. Longbeards work good in the wings to buff leadership in the flanks, and having warrior units means you can save gold for more missile units and artillery.
*'''Longbeards (Great Weapons)''': While the difference between shield Warriors and shield Longbeards isn't much, the great weapon variant favours the Longbeards, which come with Charge Defense and Armor-Piercing (but no target specialization). In MP, where every gold coin counts, if all you need is cheap AP, take the Warriors, but if you want something tankier and able to encourage your Dwarfs to hold out a bit longer, take these guys.
**'''The Grumbling Guard'''(ROR): Not too bad, stat wise its a bit more armour & melee attack, 10 more leadership, and 13 more Melee Defence, which puts them at a whopping 51 Melee Defence. You don't get any improved damage output with these guys, instead you get an ability that replenishes 9% of vigour for them and nearby allies. This may not sound like much, but fatigue debuffs are crippling for units, and Dwarfs rely on grinding things out so even a small vigour buff to some units is good even if it just moves them from exhausted to very tired. But wait, this ability has infinite uses and a low cooldown so spam it away. While Hammerers do the same job but better, the Grumbling Guard are fantastic for keeping Ironbreakers in better condition than their enemies.
*'''Slayers''': Slayers are kind of weird. They're unbreakable, quick (for a Dwarf), hit hard, and do a lot of damage with no consideration to survivability. This means that they can seriously fuck up higher-tier units but on the same time are vulnerable to cannon fodder. It does not matter if you're a crappy Goblin with a crappy spear, it's getting through a Slayer's hide as much as a Chosen's Daemonforged Axe. When using Slayers, hold them back so that other units, especially ones with charge defense, take the brunt of the charge before moving the slayers to counter-attack, and while it might cost you the charge bonus, having them attack through the buffer unit really improves the lifespan of your Slayers (Probably much to their chagrin). Note that if you ever leave them in the open, missile units just have to imagine shooting them to wipe the unit, which is an expensive mistake. Also a definite must take against Vampire Counts and Tomb Kings with all their Fear effects but do not ever think about using them against Vampire Pirates because they will get shot to pieces before any Fear/Terror units get close for the Unbreakable to matter. Also, leave them at home against Wood Elves, or if you have fore-knowledge that your opponent likes horse-archer tactics.
*With the Dwarf rework that dropped together with Thorek Ironbrow, they went from terrible in Single Player to a pretty good choice for the early game, since you can now recruit them anywhere as long as your grudge meter is up. It also makes unlimited Slayer Doomstacks lead by Ungrim Ironfist a terrifying sight to behold.
**'''Dragonback Slayers'''(ROR): Slayers with better MA & MD, and they get physical resistance on top of the shield defense. The real value comes with their passive that activates in melee, it gives them fire damage, fire resistance, and applies slow debuff and the Flammable trait for weakness to fire (doesn't stack if the enemy already has the Flammable trait, but will stack with other effects of a different name that reduce fire resistance). The physical resist, slow debuff and the combo of fire damage and Flammable debuff makes this unit a generally better pick over vanilla Slayers, note that they do not get the fire resistance outside of combat so getting hit by flaming missiles outside of combat will hurt, the Lore of Fire spells are still subject to Dwarf magic resistance though.
*'''Giant Slayers''': These are just super Slayers, too costly to run a lot of. They will instantly blend light cavalry units like Marauder Horsemen or Ellyrian Reavers that dare to charge them, not that you should be using them to counter these units, it's just funny to see happen. Giant Slayers are basically Ungrim Ironfist as many Dwarfs instead of one. What they don't kill will be pretty close to death. Cannon fodder might counter Slayers, but Giant Slayers dish out enough melee damage that you only need to worry about elite infantry and high mass units charging them. More vulnerable to shooting as they don't get the missile defense that Slayers get, these guys are expensive but do the job. Not recommended as a staple unit in army builds due to their cost, but good to pick if you're against monster or cavalry heavy armies.
*'''Hammerers''': Your well-armored, AP Damage dealing elite Dwarfs, not the same tank as a Longbeard but will deal serious AP damage. They've been reworked in the latest game, giving them substantially more health and magical(!) damage, meaning they're your best chance against Daemons and Treekin. **Still the same weaknesses as before, though: they're a Hammer (heh) in an Army of Anvils, so they'll mostly be pushing their way through your infantry
**Peak Gate Guard(ROR): The ultimate anti-armor unit, they go through heavily armored units like swordsmen through Skavenslaves and then let other Dawi also participate in the fun.

===Ranged Infantry===
*'''Thunderers''': Like Empire handgunners, but you don't need to babysit them as much. A very useful unit even in the lategame that won't break the bank.
*'''Irondrakes:''' Where the fun begins. Ridiculously high damage output, solidly armoured. Need positioning to work right, but will absolutely demolish anything that you point them at. Their flamethrowers are considered artillery so they cannot be blocked by shields and inflict morale penalty upon anything they hit. They are surprisingly strong in melee against infantry if not deployed in a thin line because the back row can use their flamethrowers at point-blank, but not against cavalry as they'll pierce till the back row.
**'''The Skolder Guard'''(ROR): Replaces Lava for Steam to be an anti-armor unit. Much tougher than an Irondrakes with Physical resistance which is nice to have when the enemy gets a sneaky charge. They will multch full-plate units quickly given they have an even faster reload speed but watch out as you will also burn through their limited ammunition just as quickly. Against enemies with less armor you're better off using regular Irondrakes.
*'''Irondrakes (Trollhammer Torpedo)''': the Anti large version of the Irondrakes, having rocket launchers instead of Flamers. Often times Irondrakes can just melt through the armor of most things they are pointed at, sometimes they are Cavalry or monsters that have enough armor to shrug off that current of magma. Unlike regular Irondrakes they can shoot over units and obstacles. Don't be fooled by how their torpedoes explode, they don't do splash damage and should only attack infantry if you don't have anything bigger to shoot.

===Combined Infantry===
*'''Quarrellers''': Boring but practical. Like dwarf warriors, they're able to trade shots with the tier 1 ranged units of pretty much every other faction and winning because they come with shields on top of their dwarf armor. They also come with armor piercing, which makes them a budget option for shooting stuff like chaos warriors. However, they do less DPS per gold spent than similar units like empire crossbowmen and darkshards.
**As mentioned above, Thorek brings out the best in these guys, keeping them very relevant even to the late game. The shield variant is best used against missile-heavy factions like Wood Elves, but does nothing against Artillery.
*'''Quarrellers (Great Weapons)''': Similar to Quarrelers, except they give up shields in exchange for armor-piercing melee weapons. Won't win much in close combat, but they'll take down more enemies before they're overwhelmed, particularly against squishy units like harpies.
**Thorek buffs them to an insane degree to the point that when combined with all the relevant campaign bonuses, Quarrelers will become the core of your army. They're still not a frontline since they only have so many models in a unit, but 6-10 of these guys can outright delete anything that gives your Longbeards and Ironbreakers a hard time (Mammoths, stonehorns, even Rogue Idols). They also autoresolve very well, taking more losses than the shielded variant, but will take less losses than your frontline infantry.
*'''Miners (Blasting Charges)''': take that Cheap miner, then give them a single volley for bomb-throwing. Each model only gets one bomb, so make it count. Turn off ''Fire at Will'' and select the targets manually. A well-thrown Blasting Charge will decimate most charging infantry.
**'''Ekrund Miners'''(ROR): A regiment that Gets 3 Blasting Charges instead of 1. Depending on how well you managed them, that's paying less gold then recruiting 3 Blasting Charge Miners which matter very much in the gold restricted multiplayer.
*'''Ironbreakers''': The fact that Ironbreakers are one of the toughest units in the game would make them a key part of a Dawi late game army. Add to that blasting charges and you have something which can stomp most other infantry into the ground, blowing away a quarter of their hitpoints and ruining their charge before finishing off the survivors. Their only downside is that their damage in hand to hand is not that great, but that's what thunderers, slayers and artillery is for. NEVER let artillery, including artillery towers, target them. They're so slow they're target practice and they're no.1 priority as dwarfs don't have anything bigger.
**'''Norgrimlings Ironbreakers''':(ROR) Even better Ironbreakers, With bigger model size (so more bombes and unit health), a faster throwing arm, Vanguard, and Immune to Psychology. Overall a more powerful unit that can holds back the hords for longer while dealing more casualties.
*'''Rangers''': Sneaky Dwarf Quarrellers getting Vanguard and Stalk for a surprise Dwarf ambush. They have better speed to help with positioning and catching enemies at least when compared to other Dawi. They're armour is pretty good for most armies, but among Dwarfs they're on the lower end of defenses.
*'''Rangers (Great Weapons)''': Ranger equivalent of Quarrellers(Great Weapons) with one key difference; unlike the great weapon Quarreler the Rangers give up their crossbows entirely in favor of shorter ranged, higher AP throwing axes. Surprise AP flanking is a thing any Dwarf list could ask for. Keep in mind that each dwarf only carries 8 axes, so they'll run out much quicker than other rangers. Once they run out of throwing axes they become a decent anti-armour skirmishing unit, although their low defense means they need to chose their opponents carefully.
**'''Ulthar's Raiders'''(ROR) a unit your should be more careful with than just normal Rangers with Great Weapons, as they get the [[Witch Hunter]]'s ability to Mark a unit for death. You do get a fair amount of range despite having only infantry speed, being able to strip an enemy of a lot of their protection they had against ranged weapons. Good take if your using a Focus fire strategy, assuming your can keep the Raiders safe while making back their cost.
*'''Bugman's Rangers''' Surprisingly not a ROR. Improved Rangers, having the regenerative and drunkenness properties of Bugman's liquid courage. they are better at fighting off harassers while their improved shooting and HP recovery help them win archer fights. These are to Rangers as Longbeards are to Warriors: a straight upgrade assuming you can afford it. In MP, they can last longer without support and work best if you're good at micro. If not, you're probably better just leaving them at home in favor of more units of regular rangers.

===Cavalry===
Does not exist. See Slayers, Rangers and Air Units if you want something fast, you beardling.

===Artillery===
*'''Bolt Thrower:''' Your cheaper anti-large Artillery. More accurate and shoots faster than a cannon, but outclassed by them in splash and penetration power. Best used to take out elite cavalry and monsters in the early campaign.
*'''Grudge Thrower''': Your first artillery unit. Fills a role like an Empire Mortar as a long-range anti-infantry weapon giving it has the largest radius of splash damage on impact.
**'''Gob-Lobber (Grudge Thrower)(ROR)''': Like the Grudge Thrower, but better. Also has live Goblins bolted to the projectiles. Causes morale penalties to targets, which stacks with the penalty for being hit by artillery.
*'''Cannon:''' Your classic artillery. Slow to fire but harder to dodge, best used as an Anti-large weapon while also killing models in high armor units, through can have difficulties hitting if the enemy zigzags too much like most Artillery units.
*'''Organ Gun:''' An effective horse begone tool, with good armor piercing and a ton of cannon balls flying everywhere, cavalry will quickly and efficiently die off in droves as your foe rages, if there’s no cav to shoot, then this thing is good for pulping infantry and can do a decent job at eliminating chariots.
*'''Flame Cannon''' Jack-of-all-trades artillery. Great area damage to deal with blobs of infantry and while it doesn't cause AP damage, its base damage is high enough that it doesn't matter. Funny enough, its stats make it much better at breaking towers and walls than cannons.

===Air Units===
The closest thing to "cavalry". Flying Bombers. Fill a role as the fast-moving guns to shoot at enemy flanks and drop anti-infantry bombs. The rotor blades can also dish out a good amount of melee damage, but having almost no melee defense makes them relatively fragile despite having high armor. They are often safe in the air, but keep them away from other flyers and AP missiles. Despite this, they are absurdly fast having speed in the 200s to run from most problems (only Pegasus Knights or Hawk Riders could catch them without nets or debuffs). To use effectively will require some mico.

*'''Gyrobomber:''' Your dedicated bomber which sacrifices other aspects to be the best at that. As a single mobile unit dedicated to hovering over infantry to drop annihilating bombs multiple times during a game, they obviously require the most micromanagement. A well placed carpet bombing can absolutely devastate the enemy frontline, and its machine gun can put out Ratling-Gun levels of DPS on a much more mobile platform.
Important to note that on small unit scale, the gyrobombers bombs are not reduced in damage, so one gyrobomber becomes an army-shredding machine on that unit scale, and putting 2-3 or even more in every army will be an auto-win for the campaign
**'''Skyhammer(ROR)''': Drops cluster bombs, so be aware that the damage-area is greater than the marker shows. Basically the Dwarfs answer to big aoe magic to obliterate chaff and elite units alike.
*'''Gyrocopter:''' Your anti-infantry skirmishers, shooting and bombing out those enemy gunners and artillery that thought themselves safe so far in the back. Also good at harassing the harassers that thought they could run a circle around the slowly pivoting Dawi gun lines.
*'''Gyrocopter (Brimstone Gun):''' Switches from general anti-infantry to majority AP damage to harass and focus down targets with more armor. Generally speaking, superior in almost every way to regular Gyrocopters. Fire damage puts a serious dent in units with regeneration (and Wood Elves) and the lower base damage is neglible when you take AP into consideration.

==Tactics==
===Multiplayer Strategies===
Dwarfs are one of the most unique factions in the game battle wise, with an utter lack of mobility and magick, and focusing everything on tanky infantry that can deal decent damage, and powerful guns and artillery. Unfortunately for them, this uniqueness means that unless you're fighting other Dwarfs, you don't have any balanced match ups against other races. Against some you have a clear, obvious advantage and tend to stomp, and against others, they give you swirlies in the bathroom for your lunch money. This is why most competitive players think they're one of the best counterpick factions as you can avoid your bad match ups and play in a favorable situation. Anyway, here's how you can satisfy the grudge against the other races:

*'''Beastmen''': A rush faction, Beastmen will have a hell of a time against you, if you play your cards right. Their complete lack of armor leaves them quite vulnerable to Thunderer fire on the approach and Bolt Throwers can slice through Minotaurs and Cygors with relative ease. Keep a solid screen of staunch Dwarf Warriors between your ranged units and the enemy and bring (Giant) Slayers to turn the Bestigor and Centigor Herds into ground beef.

*'''Bretonnia''': The peasantry of the Bretonnians can safely be ignored (except Foot Squires, after their buffs they can actually fuck you up pretty good), as they'll struggle to do anything to your heavy armor. Instead, you'll want to focus on bringing down their armored cavalry, particularly the Grail Knights and Grail Guardians leading the charges into you. Trollhammer Irondrakes serve fantastically as a powerful Horse-B-Gone tool and your Giant Slayers can chunk through most of their cavalry so long as they're not the ones receiving the initial charge. Bolt Throwers are, again, a powerful tool to use while the Bretonnian cav is on the approach. Just make sure that you keep your flanks thoroughly secure.

*'''[[Total_War_Warhammer/Tactics/Chaos_Dwarfs| Chaos Dwarfs]]''': Here's the thing about the Dawi-Zharr: their Dwarf units are generally better than yours one-on-one but are far more expensive. You can fill the field with heavily armored and relatively cheap infantry while they have to fill it with greenskin slaves.As a result your army as a whole has better staying power than theirs. Your Thunderers in particular are much cheaper than Fireglaives and have better range than Blunderbusses. Chaos Dwarf artillery can pose a big problem as you are pretty stationary and that's what they love but your cannons get a lot more shots per unit than theirs do and if you play your cards right you can win artillery duels. Watch out for Magma Cannons however, as the burning vortex their shots leave behind can really mess up an artillery crew - focus them down first if possible. Chaos Dwarfs also have lots of big monsters and chariots which will be a problem for you just as they always are. Your best bet is to shoot them down ASAP and if all else fails have a few Slayers in reserve. Gryrobombers can do pretty good against clumped Chaos Dwarf elite infantry and have a place in this matchup.

*'''Daemons of Chaos''': Expect Khorne Furies and a mostly Slaanesh-roster. see Slaanesh's guide below on how to deal with this. The good news is that since daemons of Chaos don't have access to greater daemon lords, you 'might' be able to deal with their hero-class lords. But this is mostly a full pain matchup for you, due to the access to the Slaanesh-roster daemons have.

*'''Chaos Warriors''': For Grungni's sake, keep your distance! Chaos Warriors are as tough as you are and hit harder in melee. Stock up on Thunderers and cannons, and bring some great weapon fighters to finish them off. Slayers can help as long as you're careful to make sure the enemy can't hit back. Keep your eyes out for flanking cavalry and chariots, and pray to the gods you can shoot those heathens before they reach your lines!

*'''Dark Elves''': This is a really tricky matchup for you; Dark Elves are fast and bring absurd AP damage in melee and at a range. Your biggest advantage is your superior range and you'll need to lean on it heavily to stand a chance. Grab cannons, Grudge Throwers, Rangers, and Quarrelers and hope to Grungi you can shoot them down before they get close enough to return the favor.

*'''Dwarfs''': Hopefully you have a general idea on the strengths of this faction, you're playing as them! Anti-Armor, full stop. Organ Guns, take the Skolder Guard and bring some Hammerers to crack open your opponent's can.

*'''Empire''': The Empire can be a tricky one because they're almost as good at artillery as you are while also having good cavalry and skirmishers. You'll need to stock up on gyrobombers to disrupt their flanking cavalry and Slayers to take out their knights. Irondrakes can also work well at deleting any aggressive demigryphs or knights. Beyond that, you should double down on your strengths and keep your artillery safe; the human lines will break before yours do.

*'''Greenskins''': As satisfying as it is to bury an axe in a greenskins skull, you are better off dealing with these guys from a distance. Quarrelers and Rangers are your friends here; quantity is as important as quality when fending off a green tide. Organ Guns and Cannons will be better at dealing with monsters than your Slayers, you don't want to send unarmoured units against Arachnarok Spiders or Rogue Idols. Don't forget your Irondrakes and/or your flame cannons, they can melt down anything from goblins to stone trolls. And keep your flanks protected from chariots and pump-wagons, they can wreak havoc on your lines and just ruin your day.

*'''Grand Cathay''': This is another instance of a faction that does what you do, only a hell of a lot worse. Yeah, you won't have to worry too much about these guys when they show up. Your missile boxes beat their missile boxes, their Cav is subpar and will get eaten by Slayers, and the only AP infantry that they have is Anti Large, which you don't have. Box up, get some cannons and Quarrelers, sit back and enjoy some Bugmans as the Cathayans desperately try to figure out how the fuck they're getting into your backline. Yes they do have their own little airforce, but do you really think Umgi inventions can compete with Dawi Gyrocopters? No. If they bring Sky Junks, send some Gyrocopters after them to pick them down. This faction might get more scary as DLC comes out, but for now this should be an easy win as long as you know what you're doing.

*'''High Elves''': Don't let the War of the Beard fool you, this will be one of your hardest match ups. High Elves have a lot of things that threaten you, but the things to fear the most would be their Chariots, Mages, White Lions and <s>Sisters of Averlorn</s> (they do magic damage so their AP isn't as useful as you think). Seriously, any High Elf player who knows what they're doing is going to spam White Lions and it is going to SUCK. Your best bet is to spam either Gyrocopters or Cannons and spread the field. Force the High Elves to have to either attack your artillery emplacements one at a time, allowing your others to fire freely, or use your air power and artillery to spread them apart and pick off pockets. Hammerers also have a niche in this match up, because they beat White Lions pretty hard one-on-one and with support from guns or chaff, they can go toe to toe with Swordmasters (Though don't count on that). Of course, these plans aren't perfect. There's a 99% chance they will bring Alarielle for Tempest and heals to deal with Gyros and they have plenty of mobility to get at your cannons to give the White Lions time to get in. Sadly, this is one of those match ups where even if you bring the most optimized Anti Elgi list possible, there's still a pretty decent chance you'll lose. Avoid this match up if you can.

*'''Khorne''': It's Khorne, c'mon. Warriors of chaos with somehow even less ranged and even killier once they reach your front lines. Bring plenty of armor-piercing infantry and ranged. If you want to live, protect your artillery from Khorne's furies and calvary.

*'''Kislev''': Kislev's big weakness is that their ranged firepower is also their melee power due to hybrid units, and while this seems great at first glance, they sacrifice both elements to have the other. Your artillery and ranged firepower will dump all over Kislev, your biggest concern are War Bears and Sleds, to which you should apply Slayers. Focus down the wizards and you'll out-brutalize Kislev in good time.

*'''Lizardmen''': Lizardmen are a bit of a mixed bag. On one hand, you can scoff at all the Skinks as they ping impotently off of your armor (unless they're the Red-Crested variety). On the other, Saurus are just as stubborn as you are and will take days to chew through without good AP. Bring some Hammerers to eek out an advantage in the inevitable grindfest you'll end up in. Take advantage of the Lizardmen's dearth of ranged firepower and massacre their forces with Irondrakes and Thunderers, while your Dwarf Warriors hold their front line at bay. You have excellent anti-monster units in the form of your Giant Slayers who absolutely will butcher any big dinosaur thrown into your ranks so long as you have some chaff to help trap and soak the damage the beasties can toss about. Though Skinks will largely prove a minor nuisance at best to a majority of your forces, you will ''definitely'' want to screen your (Giant) Slayers from the Skirmishing variety. Key players to watch out for are going to be the Slann Mage-Priests, Skink Priests and Kroxigors. Slann, especially fire/high Slann and Heavens Skink Priests can wreak utter havoc upon your forces with the myriad of vortex spells they can toss out, like candy from a parade float and they should absolutely be prioritized if you find them on the field. (Sacred) Kroxigors, if fielded, are surprisingly vicious anti-infantry monsters and will bowl over a majority of the infantry they're pointed at. Giant Slayers and Trollhammer Irondrakes serve as a solid counter, but you'll still want to swamp the Kroxigors in chaff to mitigate the damage they deal in turn.

*'''Norsca''': This is an easy fight for you. All of that monster hunting anti-large equipment the Norscans bring is going to fly right over your head as you bury your axes in their unarmoured pecs. Bring plenty of Cannons and Bolt Throwers to shoot down enemy Mammoths and bring some Irondrakes to shoot down anything else. Norscans are usually unarmoured, so you can trade your Thunderers for Quarrelers for the better range. Stick to the basics and you'll do fine.

*'''Nurgle''': Holy shit, a faction that might actually be slower than you! And it seems like you will have a hefty advantage as they don't really have a lot of ways to stop your artillery. The biggest thing you will probably have to worry about is their air force, and Furies and Rotflies will be gunning for that back line. Keep some Slayers near your guns, and get ready to surround them if they try to land. After that you just got to deal with Nurgle's rush of Plaguebearers and Nurglings, and I hope you're ready for nothing to ever die ever because that's likely what is gonna happen when Dawi and Nurgle clash. On the ground, Plague Toads and Pox Riders will likely be your biggest threat with their anti-infantry, but they're also big models, so guns and Slayers should do the trick. Expect a Herald as the commander, and if he's dumb enough to bring a Great Unclean One, laugh and shoot it to pieces. With the new debuffs fire damage does to healing, it might also be wise to break out the Irondrakes and Flame Cannons -- you'll have plenty of time to lob napalm at those shambling hordes of Plaguebearers.
** CoC DLC has brought some changes with access to marked WoC units for Nurgle; the units you will definitely see in this match-up now include Nurgle-marked Chaos Knights, Nurgle-marked Chaos Chariots, Nurgle-marked Chaos Warriors/Chosen with Great Weapons and Nurgle Marauder Horsemen with throwing axes. Knights & Chariots are especially a threat, as they will survive long enough from their speed+armour+Nurgle Mark to get behind your lines and wipe artillery or rear-charge your line infantry. Great weapon Warriors/Chosen, while still vulnerable to your guns when getting to your lines, are both units that have respectable chances of beating your units in the grind with their standard WoC stats, but now plus the Nurgle Mark. The Nurgle Warshrine is a strong support piece for the army, but like a GUO its something Dwarfs can delete so easily that you really should not see it. Generally expect Nurgle armies facing you to have a decent share of Nurgle-marked Mortal units from WoC now, unless your opponent hates themselves.

*'''Ogre Kingdoms''': This match is either gonna be your easiest or your hardest, as this comes down to the skill of you, the Ogre player, and what units you brought to the table. The Ogres have massive charge bonuses, but a lot of your units have charge defense, however unlike other factions, the Ogres will only lose half due to their Ogre Charge trait. The biggest threat the Ogres bring to you is their artillery, and if you leave them be they'll reap a devasting toll on your infantry. The good news is, that with the exception of Leadbelchers, all their artillery are a single model. Have your Cannons and Gyrocopters focus them down and you are good to go, or so you would think. Besides the Gnoblars, Ogres are all monster units, which means two things. One is that your artillery and Slayers will have a field day, but two is that their shockingly fast speed means they're gonna out run you and try to outmaneuver you at every opportunity. Your army should be a good balance of Longbeards, or if you are pinching pennies, Dwarf Warriors, they all have charge defense and can help hold the charging balls of lubber back. This is one of the match up where having a ton of Slayers is a good thing, and stack up on them to defend your back lines and cut the Ogres down to size. Your artillery should consist of two, maybe three Cannons to take out artillery and thin their numbers. Irondrakes with Trollhammer Torpedoes won't be a bad call, but they're on the pricey end. Besides some of their units, bring at least two, or simply one unit of Thunderers at most, because a lot of their stuff is unarmored, your main missile troop should be Quarrelers, they're cheap and will have a good time turning Ogres into pin-cushions and are strong enough to fend off Sabertusks. Your artillerys targeting priority should look something like this: artillery units (Ironblasters first, then Leadbelchers), Stonehorns, and finally, everything else. This should be the only match up where you shouldn't bother bringing Miners with Blasting Charges. The only thing they'll have an effect on is Gnoblars and strictly that, which is a waste of cash and will earn you a grudge for being wasteful. Now get out there and strike out some grudges agaisnt the fat bastards!

*'''Skaven''': This is probably the closest we'll get to a 40k-esque matchup (you know, <strike>aside the irony of neither the [[Squats|Dwarfs]] or Skaven being in that setting</strike> [[Leagues of Votann|The Kin has declared a Grudge against the manling who wrote that]]). Between your guns and artillery and their guns and artillery, most of the damage either of you will be dealing to each other will be done from afar. A majority of the Skaven infantry is quite helpless against your frontline infantry, but you'll have a hell of a time pinning anything down with the Skavens quicker movement speeds. Grudge Throwers are going to be king against most Skaven infantry builds, while Bolt Throwers or Cannons should be fielded to snipe any Warp-Lighting Cannons, Plagueclaw Catapults or Hellpit Abominations they have downfield. Warplock Jezzails will be a priority target to focus fire down, as are Warpfire Throwers and Poison Wind Globadiers, should they start getting too close. Aside utilizing their missile units against them, Skaven have absolutely no aerial presence, meaning your Gyrocopters will have virtually free reign to gun down rats at will.

*'''Slaanesh''': A bad day for you all around. It's become apparent, that if you're unlucky enough to run into Slaanesh, you're going to want to forego ranged firepower almost entirely, Miners with Blasting Charges and Ironbreakers will trade efficiently, maybe a safety pick of Thunderers to deal with a Keeper Of Secrets, but AP on everything, Furies, Spawn and chariots will just pulverize your formations in one of the most one-sided setups in the game right now.

*'''Tomb Kings''': The good news is that Tomb Kings don't like fire, and you have fire aplenty. Brimstone Gun-equipped Gyrocoptors are your fastest fire-delivery system, but Irondrakes and Flame Cannons are useful as well. The bad news is, that you don't like chariots, and they have chariots aplenty. Use every trick you can to soften up the chariots before they hit your lines; but it's unlikely you'll be able to stop them all. Grab some Giant Slayers to finish off the ones that survive your barrage and hope it's enough to keep them down. Tomb Kings infantry is no match for you, so you should build your army against their monsters and chariots.

*'''Tzeentch''': Ooh, here is somebody that's going to hate you. Tzeentch units are squishy and their ranged units only have middling range and are better for kiting. He also has no artillery other than Soul Grinders, few big monsters outside of Lords of Change, and relies heavily on spamming spells to activate their army abilities. Bring a Runelord or Thorek on an Anvil of Doom and laugh as their casters explode. Otherwise, pound them into dust with artillery, as they have few answers to an army with better range than them. Just guard the back line against Furies and Doom Knights and don't bother with air units, they'll get shot down in short order.

*'''Vampire Coast''': The most common Vampire Coast strategy is to bunker up with a large number of cheap ranged units and heavy artillery. If that sounds familiar, it's only because it's the same thing you like to do, you're just better at it. Bring plenty of Cannons and some Slayers to deal with the enemy monsters (hint: kill the Necrofex Colossi first). Once the big monsters have been dealt with, the pirates are basically just an inferior version of you, clumps of Quarrelers and Thunderers are plenty to take down the Zombies. And remember not to bunker up too tightly; you may have magic resistance but Winds of Death will still hurt.

*'''Vampire Counts''': Virtually nothing that makes up the rank and file of the Vampire Counts will pose a significant threat to you. Skeletons and Zombies will only serve to slow down your already plodding advance and only deal any meaningful "damage" to you simply by sponging your limited ranged firepower meant for something else. The only standard units that you'll find yourself at a significant disadvantage against will be the Cairn and Hex Wraiths, given your general lack of magical damage. You'll want to engage them with missile attacks for maximum effect and make sure that you are braced for their charges. The main thing you should be focused on taking down will be the Lords and Heroes leading the army; without them, the undead hordes will quickly fall apart (literally). They also pose the single biggest threat to everything you have, as their Lore of Death casters can delete swathes of your army with a single well placed cast if you are positioned carelessly.

*'''Wood Elves''': Wood Elves are an extremely annoying foe who are fundamentally the exact opposite of you. Their infantry can run circles around yours and they can deal frightening amounts of damage against their intended targets, but you'll snap their twiggy spines if you whip 'em with your beards. In general, you're going to be engaged in a very tedious game of "keep away", where the Wood Elves are going to be dancing just outside of your reach while their Glade Guard and Waywatchers pepper you with AP arrows and occasionally test your flanks for weaknesses via Wild Rider/Great Stag Knight cycle charges. Fortunately, you do have a couple tools the elves don't: Artillery. Grudge Throwers excel against WE infantry and can discourage them from trying to camp too far away, while Bolt Throwers and Flame Cannons will make mince-meat of the cavalry/Forest Spirits that may try to break through your lines. Speaking of Forest Spirits, Irondrakes will ''incinerate'' them. Slayers also help against the bigger tree spirits in theory, but the ranged power the Wood Elves bring make them a dicey proposition. As far as their melee infantry options are concerned, the only ones that majorly threaten you are the Bladesingers; their anti-armor magical attacks will scythe through your armor will jaw-dropping speed. Use Thunderers to soften them up on the charge then use Slayers to cut them down swiftly.

===Domination===
General Tier Rank: '''F'''

You are just SO FUCKING SLOW. You opponent is going to get to the point first, no question about it and most armies have plenty of ways to roadblock you in order to stop you from getting on them. While few factions will be able to contest you in a head on charge for the midpoint, once they start going for the side points you will have no way to out contest them. Important to note that there are some maps that you won't get completely dumpstered automatically. The more choke points that are on a map, the better it is for you because then the enemy will be more forced to try to take you head on instead of just avoid direct contact with you in an attempt to cap more points. However, even then there's no way you can outmaneuver your enemy unless they fall asleep at their computer out of boredom. Don't play Dwarfs in Domination until they get some major buffs, a DLC, or rework that will help them move around the map better.

However if you still decide to stay committed to playing dwarfs, the general tip is seize two caps at least and have a squadron of gyrocopters and bombers to harass the foe, ironbreakers are king here, jam them on a point and laugh as your opponent struggles to get them off, rangers and miners are key here as they are the only units with vanguard deployment (this includes the ROR ironbreakers) to delay the foe by brawling with them as your slower units get into position or to reinforce your troops if needed, slayers are necessary here as besides gyrocopters, their the fastest thing you got, bring along 3, 4 if needed, to both delete cav or monsters too big for their britches and do aforementioned delaying tactics, for artillery, on smaller maps, organ guns and flame cannons will be an excellent infantry/cavalry begone tool for clearing out points that are infested with enemy troops, as per the norm, bring a cannon to deal with enemy artillery and snipe monsters regardless of the map size, on longer maps, the grudge-thrower will be a much better alternative for clearing out points, but organ guns and flame cannons are a good deterrent for defending points, as they’ll delete blobs, just make sure there safe from enemy cav and flyers, however the one weakness as listed above, is your slowness, you need to be smart if you want to consistently win domination as dwarfs, assume a box formation as units in said shape, turn about faster and thus let them react to threats flanking around or move to different points faster if it’s necessary (keep in mind, it does not increase movement speed, it just hastens how fast they turn), while it is vulnerable to artillery fire, your cannons should already be firing at said artillery, follow this guide somewhat well and proceed to wipe every smug grin off with an axe, show every YouTuber good or otherwise how wrong they were as you strike out grudges and get vengeance for every domination tier list that put you in F tier!

===Campaign Strategies===
*'''Karaz-A-Karak''': Karaz-A-Karak starts out with a solid base economy and a protected position, with your flanks covered by minor dwarven factions and only one Greenskin faction as your initial enemy. However, that start is deceivingly simple at first; once Grimgor and Queek get going, your position will become increasingly precarious if you're not careful. Your biggest weakness is easily your very slow growth, as the Greenskins and Skaven often will have higher tier units much sooner than you do. Making the jump from Tier 3 to 4 as soon as you can is your top priority. Once your scary lategame units arrive, you can start to dominate the Southlands and expand in any direction you damn please.
**'''Pick Gronbrimdal (Mortal Empires only)''': There is no reason to ever pick Thorgim over Grombrindal as your starting LL. Grombrindal comes with a much better selection of starting units (Gyrocopters, Irondrakes and Thunderers) and his blue skill tree might be one of the most blatantly overpowered things in the game on its own, as Grombrindals variants of the perks not just affect his army, but your entire faction. Thorgrim can be recruited later down the line regardless.
**'''Don't get bogged down''': The initial 50 turns of any campaign might just be called "get ready for Grimgor". While you can expand quickly at the start, it is ill advised (and very tempting) to stray too far from your Capital and end up with your armies battering against your starting enemies while Grimgor happily carves a path straight towards Karaz-A-Karak. Losing Karaz-A-Karak becomes a win condition in this case; if you can successfully defend it, the Greenskins are finished, if you lose it, you can restart a new campaign.

'

*Clan Angrund''' In immortal empires Belegar's difficulty level has been severely reduced, on turn one as soon as you take your first settlement you can full-confederate Karak Izor instantly. After that it's the usual hop and skip to Karak-Eight-Peaks, however with it in Skarsnik's hands now, it's significantly easier to take as Skarsnik doesn't start with a full 20 stack army unlike the 'Crooked Moon Mutineers' from Warhammer 2.
[[Category:Total Warhammer]] {{Total War Warhammer Tactics}}

Total War Warhammer/Tactics/Dwarfs

2023-06-12T17:10:22Z

2A02:1810:4E2C:A900:DC0E:597F:F427:CBEB: /* Legendary Heroes (Clan Angrund Only) */

{{Topquote|Kazukhan-kazakit-ha! (Look out, the Dwarfs are on the warpath!)|Game battle chant for Dwarfs, if you think about it, it should be look <s>down</s> THAT'S A GRUDGE!}}
This is the tactics page for the Total War: Warhammer version of The Dwarfs.

==Why play Dwarfs?==
*Because you want to sit and watch as your enemies are blasted away while coming towards you.
*Cause you're under 5'5 and want '''vengeance''' for all the short jokes.
*You don't want to do too much micro, so an army without much in the way of mobility and cavalry doesn't bother you as much.
*You enjoy having infantry that won't die after being slapped by a wet noodle.
*Slay everything without a beard!!
*FLAMETHROWERS!!!

===Pros===
*'''Durability''': You are a tank faction. Most of your units are categorized with high armour, melee defense and leadership. Even your tier one and chaff are very tanky compared to counterparts from other factions. This is further supplemented by the innate magic resist many of your units have, which ''slightly'' compensates for your otherwise complete lack of magic. Additionally, with their naturally high leadership, dwarfs do not usually break unless hopelessly outnumbered or if you screw up massively by getting cavalry charged in the rear. Frankly, your units will hold out forever.
**Your magic resistance got nerfed in the third game to ''only'' resist magical spells. Still useful, but now units with magic attacks, I.E Daemons, are going to be way better at cracking you open.
*'''Range''': Guns, guns and more guns! Dwarfs have some of the best blackpowder units in the entire game. Thunderers and Cannons can lay a whooping on anything they are firing on, and their artillery isn't anything to sneer at. Even their non-AP range units are very good for their price, and it's not hard for them to earn their points back as long as they are defended.
*'''If they get close, Nut 'em!''': As if being being one of the best factions at shooting was not enough, their missile units can also hold their own in close quarters better than most.
*'''Airforce''': Gyrocopters with their anti large can get you control over the air, and their ability to kite monsters into oblivion is a good skill to have. Even Gyrobombers have a niche for their blob killing capabilities after recent buffs.
*'''Runes''': Where other races rely on the fickle Winds of Magic, you have your reliable runes. Runes supply surprisingly good buffs and debuffs that can help your army out, making them a great way to make sure your infantry stays in the fight a bit longer. The fact that they aren't limited by a power reserve also means that they'll remain a viable option well into the latter stages of a fight, where other factions might begin to tap out of their mystical power.
*'''Anti-large''': You laugh when the enemy brings big monsters. With all your AP missiles, Anti Large artillery and slayers, you have the one of the easiest times killing monsters out of any faction in the game.
*'''Strong Economy''': It's campaign specific but yeah, it turns out the species who's renowned for being the best at making shit is also one of the best at making money. The resource building chains go up to level IV instead of stopping at level III, you can mass produce Dwarf Beer anywhere. Putting together Doomstacks of Top Tier Dawi troops is easier.
*'''Good for Beginners''': Everyone was just starting once, if you are new to Warhammer Total War or just Total War in general the Dawi are (ironically enough) forgiving. Something like the Wood Elves is fragile and has a limited margin for error, Dwarfs on the other hand have more of a fudge factor in most match ups. Not to say that it's easy mode playing dwarfs, but the likelihood of things going pear shaped in a second is lower.

===Cons===
*'''Lack of Mobility''': With no Cav, monsters and slow infantry, Dwarfs are the least mobile faction in the game. You will spend the majority of the game standing still.
*'''Lack of Magic''': Though your most recent rework makes your runes a damn good alternative, you don't really have magic. This can pose a problem when you face similarly physically durable armies in battle and lack a reliable, magical alternative for damage. Additionally, though you defensively have a 25% resistance to the arcane, many large vortex spells will still sting quite a bit and your complete lack of magical healing means it'll be hard to bounce back from the damage you do take.
*'''Chariots''': Chariots are the bane of a Dwarf players existence. They don't have any real way to lock them down and, as you'd expect, AP anti infantry can really kill what the Dwarfs want to do on the battlefield. Due to the rework to how bracing and knock down works, this isn’t as bad as before, but chariots can still be a problem
*'''Predictability''': Most veteran players know what's going to happen when Dwarfs are picked. They are going to go for a cheap, numerous and sturdy front line and a lot of guns and artillery. This means that Dwarfs are easy to plan for as they only have one real viable tactic. Building an army around fighting Dwarfs is something players from all races know how to do.
*'''Lack of Good Lord Options''': Do you like the Runelord or Thorek? No? Well you better start because in multiplayer they're your only viable options. Grombrindal is an ok duelist but honestly Dwarf lords in general kind of suck. With no mounts and no way to stick to their targets it's hard for them to get anything done. This problem got better with the Twisted and the Twilight due to the changes to knockdown effects, but sticking to targets will still be hard
*'''Hard campaign''': With all the changes to the factions around them, the Dawi have fallen on some pretty hard times. The lifetime of WH2 dotted the landscape around Karaz-A-Karak alone with a huge number of guaranteed enemies that you will have to look out for, with your most reliable allies in the Empire being very far away. The other subfactions don't fare much better and your slow growth seriously hurts your ability to expand, especially when compared with your most dominant enemies, the Greenskins of the Badlands and Clan Mors further down the road.
*'''Bad in Domination''': Turns out your stubby little legs makes it really hard for you to capture objectives. Due to your lack of mobility you can't effectively capture points since other factions can just out race you to them and get more units on them. As such, you're widely considered the weakest faction in Domination.
*'''DLC''': A con for everyone, but fortunately you get off easier than many others. Unfortunately, a couple of your best units, namely Runelords and Rangers, are in fact locked behind DLC and if you want to really use your Dwarfs to the fullest, you'll need to pay the toll.

==Universal Traits==

*'''The Great Book of Grudges''': The fact that the sacred Dammaz Kron went unmentioned on this pages for so long merits an entry on its own. The Book of Grudges documents every slight committed against your faction, including legendary grudges that you start out with. Whenever something bad happens, i.e. you lose a settlement, get raided or a hostile faction repeatedly trespasses on your turf without you allowing it, it merits an entry in the book. These entries can (and will) accumulate over time, and depending on how much your Dorfs disliked the transgression, will vary in severity, which fills up a meter that gives you some penalties and some bonusses. High severity from unresolved Grudges gives you minor public order and research speed penalties, but it also gives all of your armies a charge bonus (since the Dwarfs are so pissed off) and increases the chance of Slayers and Giant Slayers popping up in your Regiments of Renown pool, where they can then be recruited instantly into your armies. Resolving Grudges and Legendary Grudges (such as retaking Karak Eight Peaks as Belegar Ironhammer) also earns you powerful bonusses (money, Oathgold, small buffs for the entire faction ) and special Runes.
*'''Oathgold''': The secondary resource of the Dwarfs. Practically identical to the Mortuary Cult of the Tomb Kings, with the key difference being that the Dwarfs can make much more stuff with Oathgold and that the stuff is much more abundant. Oathgold is earned through resolving Grudges, doing missions and quests, Gold Mines and some special buildings such as the Brightstone Mine in Mount Gunbad. Oathgold, combined with trade goods, can be used to create items for your Lords and Heroes, which makes it downright trivial to kit out every single character on the map with some special gizmos to make them really powerful. Oathgold can also be used to make Character and Banner Runes, the former can be applied as equipment to individual characters (with up to 3 individual runes at maximum), the latter functions like Banners that you can give units to give them special bonusses and abilities.
*'''Expert Charge Defense''': Barring Slayers, every single one of your units has Expert Charge Defense, which nullifies charge bonusses and also the momentum of units charging into your staunch line of angry Dwarfs.
*'''Magic Resistance''': Every Dwarf has a built in 25% Magic Resist (Spell Resist in WH3). Consult the main page for WHFB Dwarfs as to why.

==Legendary Lords and Subfactions==
*'''Thorgrim Grudgebearer:''' The high king himself, and the only large non-war machine unit in your roster, as he is carried on a massive throne sled by some burly dwarfs, Thorgrim isn't huge on offence, better than say mid-tier combat lords, but he's mostly just a hard to kill brick of leadership. Dwarfs in range of him just become slightly harder to break, which isn't saying much given their default morale, and he's not easily sniped. This results in him being kind of underwhelming, you know he's not going to die like a bitch, but you also know that he's not exactly going to recoup even a quarter of his cost. Is kind of safe in campaign play for beginners, but Grombrindal is overall superior. - Pass.
*'''Ungrim Ironfist:''' The Slayer King, bane of anything taller than six feet, Ungrim is the opposite of Thorgrim; all offence, with low defence. Ungrim is actually pretty good in terms of being a hero-killer and monster-hunter, he's not going to solo Tyrion or Kroq-Gar, and don't even think of monster lords like Kholek or monstrous mounts such as a Tomb King on a War Sphinx, without a unit to bog them down. The problem with Ungrim is that while he can throw hands and live up to his title, he eats a lot of damage for a Dwarf, or just in general for a combat Lord, he's easy to snipe with massed missiles if caught in the open, and while he can butcher most things sent his way, he'll only be able to do this once or twice in a battle before he's at serious risk of dying. Don't let that 120 armour & Unbreakable make you think he's a tank, Ungrim's Melee Defence is quite low for a combat lord, and that low dwarf speed means he can by kited to death. Thorgrim lacks the damage to recoup his cost, Ungrim lacks the defence to recoup his costs. If playing with an ally that has access to Lore of Life he can be kept alive, but you're asking a lot of resources to support the Slayer King. - Pass.
*'''Grombrindal:''' THE WHITE DWARF, Grombrindal doesn't bring anything really special to the table, he's a decent duelist, although lacking the balls-to-the-wall offence of Ungrim Ironfist, Grombrindal is nowhere near as risky for a combat Lord. The flashbomb ability can lockdown mobile Heroes and give the White Dwarf a few easy hits. Doesn't quite bring much for the rest of the army, but is the best Legendary Lord for cost-benefit tradeoffs. He can fight, he can survive, and he can make the entire army Unbreakable with a reusable map-wide buff. - Niche but competitive in that niche. In Campaign, he is easily the best LL the Dwarfs offer. His blue skill tree affects ''your entire faction'' and the four blessings you can choose every 20 turns (10 after picking a specific skill) are all very powerful, a whopping +25% Research Rate is no joke, as are +10 Melee Attack and Defense for every unit in Grombrindals army.
*'''Belegar Ironhammer:'''(DLC) Belegar is really just a wall, he's harder to kill than Thorgrim as they have comparable stats, but he has a silver shield for 55% missile resistance. That's all. Just an insanely hard to kill Lord, sure his offence isn't terrible, being better than Thorgrim's on base stats and a nice buff can be popped to go higher. But honestly you're paying a lot for a Lord that won't die, and generally speaking Dwarfs in Total War: Warhammer aren't a faction that is centred around their generals or Heroes. No real wizards to throw high-impact spell effects, no mobile Heroes that can exploit small gaps to flank units or hunt down supporting pieces like buffers, wizards or artillery crews. The only upshot to taking Belegar's subfaction in multiplayer is getting access the Ancestor Heroes who are damned hard to kill, but are also the only Dwarf units that are scared of magic damage, which can sort of be a mind-games thing because the default assumption to seeing Clan Angrund picked is that Ancestor Heroes are on the field, so grab some magic damage to delete them, but then seeing that there are no ghost Dwarfs means that the magic damage is actually a big waste considering all Dwarfs have 25% Magic Resistance. - Pass.
*'''Thorek Ironbrow:'''(FLC): With the rework comes a new LL and Thorek serves this role, being the latest (and most likely last) new contender in the Lustrian Thunderdome in the Vortex Campaign, and starting at the southernmost tip of the map in Karak Zorn on Mortal Empires. He serves as a supercharged Runelord with access to a unique mount that messes quite a bit with enemy spellcasting and improved Runic Magic on his own part. In the campaign, his legendary conservativeness translates into bonusses for "traditional" Dwarfen ranged units like Quarrelers and Grudge Throwers. Not to worry though, since he starts with a Rune of Burning that makes the Catapult projectiles [[Awesome|FUCKING EXPLODE]] and dramatically increases the combat value of Quarrelers in his own Army quite significantly (arguably making them even better than Thunderers). His campaign goal revolves around finding several lost Dwarfen artifacts, which can then be used to craft powerful buffs for your whole faction. [[Derp|He also can make enemy casters explode.]] - Best Multiplayer Lord pick.

==Units==
===Generic Lords===
*'''Dwarf Lord:''' No, just no, he suffers from the same issue that the Legendary Lords suffer from, being too slow. But wait there's more, the generic Lord is easier to kill in combat, provides less army support, and does less damage. He's not even the cheapest option to help save costs. I mean he has a shield, but its only bronze. Unless you've got some kind of bet riding on a battle and there's a specific stipulation that you cannot use any other Lord, screw the money because he's too crap. That said compared to generic foot Lords in other factions he's quite difficult to kill, which is more advice for fighting Dwarf Lords in campaign really. PASS!
*'''Runelord:''' (DLC) Yes, yes yes. The one competitive General in multiplayer, the Runelord is just a walking bubble of passive buffs that make your low tier units good, and your good infantry units even better. Has good active abilities, like Master Rune of Oath & Steel which gives +30 armour to all dwarfs in range, or the Rune of Speed which adds 45% speed and 24 melee attack to all dwarfs in range. This is the Lord pick that supports the Dwarf army, and don't think he's some kind of wizard that dies when someone looks at him funny, while the melee defence is low at 40, the Runelord has the same 120 armour as the other Lords, plus up to 35% missile resistance, sharing 20% of that with nearby allies. Slapping him on an Anvil of Doom gives a special ability that causes enemy casters to automatically miscast for minor damage when near him. TL;DR fucks magic, gets buffs. - Good if you want Thorek but a bit cheaper.

===Legendary Heroes (Clan Angrund Only)===
[[Clan Angrund]] has such a strong relationship with their ancestors, they come back as ghosts. Like all ghosts, they have a 75% physical resistance instead of magic resistance, with magic attacks, Unbreakable, but no armor and less health than normal. They have Fear and Terror making them good at chasing the enemy off. They themselves are weak to magic attacks, but who takes that much offense magic against Dwarfs anyway?

*'''King Lunn Ironhammer:''' is one of the two ghost Thanes, being the offensive one, with slightly more Melee attack than a normal Thane.
*'''Halkenhaf Stonebeard:''' the other ghost Thane, being the most defensive of the par with significantly lower melee attack but a very high defense of 65 and silver shield, letting him minge with enemies for a protracted time to proc terror routs.
*'''Throni Ironbrow:''' Most likely to take as he is a Runesmith, so someone that needs protection while also being in the front lines.
*'''Dramar Hammerfist:''' the ghost engineer so paying extra for a harder to kill gun lines buffer and better at chasing away those that try to disrupt them.

===Heroes===
*'''Master Engineer:''' Basically a must if you're running more than 2 artillery pieces, buffs artillery, has a decent sniper rifle of his own, not great in a fight with anything beyond hound packs and light cavalry, so don't expect him to be an effective guard for the cannons he's buffing. However if there is another unit nearby casting Entrenchment right before they rout will make the unit hold the line and fight even after being routed. On campaign they also boost your army's mobility. Aaaaaand the Dwarf Rework happened, buffing him even further with the ability of the Vampirate Gunnery Wight to restore lost ammo to artillery pieces for up to five times. Just too good to miss out on if you're bringing a bunch of cannons (and who doesn't, honestly).
*'''Runesmith:''' Basically a squishier version of the Runelord, has many of the same buffs, both passive and active. With the Dwarf rework, these guys have gone from being merely decent to amazing. While utilizing a rune puts every other rune on a shared cooldown, this only applies per caster; having multiple Runesmiths allows you to stack multiple buffs simultaneously or across multiple units without having to wait out the full 60 second global cooldown. They might not necessarily be an auto-include persay, but having one or two of these guys in your army is strongly recommended.
*'''Thane:''' While they still suffer from being slow, Thanes can be used more aggressively than Legendary Lords. Kit them out with the Rune of Slowness to gimp enemy mobility, or give them the Ironbeard's Ring and coordinate with a source of fire damage: Flame Cannons, Dragonback Slayers, Warriors of Dragonfire Pass, basic Irondrakes, or Brimstone Gyrocopters, all of these will deal serious damage to units inside the debuff aura.

===Infantry===
*'''Miners''': The closest thing to cannon fodder in the Dwarf Roster, miners are cheap AP units. Also give "speed" and breadth to Dawi list by vanguarding.
*'''Dwarf Warriors''': Did you know that a unit of Dwarf Warriors costs 475 gold but can hold against 3 units of Empire Swordsmen, costing 400 gold each, for just over 2 minutes and racking up roughly 90-100 kills before dying/breaking? Dwarf Warriors aren't great, just good, and are very much just a shield wall frontline. Dwarf Warriors are very cost-effective starting units. They will trade positively against most infantry that are tier 1-3 excluding units with high AP values or anti-infantry buffs. Dwarf Warriors aren't the same as elite heavy infantry however, they will break in time, if rear charged, if attacked by great weapon units, if hit with leadership debuffs, or if attacked by characters. This is a unit that buys time for a unit in the second line to get in position to assist, do not assume you can just deploy them as a single line and have artillery sit safely behind them.
**'''Warriors of Dragonfire Pass'''(ROR): Slightly better warriors that deal fire damage in combat, not a guaranteed pick most of the time, but good against any faction that is vulnerable to fire, consider pairing with a Thane carrying Ironbeard's Ring to boost damage.
*'''Dwarf Warriors (Great Weapons)''': You know how Dwarf Warriors can hold frontlines for a time but need a second line unit to assist them, this is cheapest of the second line units. Regular warriors have shields, 40 Melee Defence, and charge defence against large units, Warriors with Great Weapons don't have those defences, they get armour piercing damage which is the kind of offence needed to make up for the vanilla warriors' shortcomings. Don't try and use them as a frontline unit, and replace them when you can with other melee infantry.
*'''Longbeards''': Warriors +1 really, they buff the leadership of other units (it's the generic Encourage passive so no stacking with Lords), so consider mixing them with warriors. Cost-wise your mostly paying for better Melee Defence, better Leadership, the leadership aura, and Immune to Psychology compared to vanilla Warriors. A common question is which is better for cost, Longbeards or Warriors, but outside of fighting undead armies that have tons of fear/terror effects, the answer to the question is; use both. While the differences between the two units are obvious in comparison, to the player on the other side of the battlefield it doesn't matter much because a Dwarf line is still a solid formation that is hard to break. Longbeards work good in the wings to buff leadership in the flanks, and having warrior units means you can save gold for more missile units and artillery.
*'''Longbeards (Great Weapons)''': While the difference between shield Warriors and shield Longbeards isn't much, the great weapon variant favours the Longbeards, which come with Charge Defense and Armor-Piercing (but no target specialization). In MP, where every gold coin counts, if all you need is cheap AP, take the Warriors, but if you want something tankier and able to encourage your dwarfs to hold out a bit longer, take these guys.
**'''The Grumbling Guard'''(ROR): Not too bad, stat wise its a bit more armour & melee attack, 10 more leadership, and 13 more Melee Defence, which puts them at a whopping 51 Melee Defence. You don't get any improved damage output with these guys, instead you get an ability that replenishes 9% of vigour for them and nearby allies. This may not sound like much, but fatigue debuffs are crippling for units, and Dwarfs rely on grinding things out so even a small vigour buff to some units is good even if it just moves them from exhausted to very tired. But wait, this ability has infinite uses and a low cooldown so spam it away. While Hammerers do the same job but better, the Grumbling Guard are fantastic for keeping Ironbreakers in better condition than their enemies.
*'''Slayers''': Slayers are kind of weird. They're unbreakable, quick (for a Dwarf), hit hard, and do a lot of damage with no consideration to survivability. This means that they can seriously fuck up higher-tier units but on the same time are vulnerable to cannon fodder. It does not matter if you're a crappy goblin with a crappy spear, it's getting through a Slayer's hide as much as a Chosen's Daemonforged Axe. When using Slayers, hold them back so that other units, especially ones with charge defense, take the brunt of the charge before moving the slayers to counter-attack, and while it might cost you the charge bonus, having them attack through the buffer unit really improves the lifespan of your slayers (Probably much to their chagrin). Note that if you ever leave them in the open, missile units just have to imagine shooting them to wipe the unit, which is an expensive mistake. Also a definite must take against vampire counts and Tomb Kings with all their fear effects but do not ever think about using them against Vampire Pirates because they will get shot to pieces before any fear/terror units get close for the unbreakable to matter. Also, leave them at home against Wood Elves, or if you have fore-knowledge that your opponent likes horse-archer tactics.
*With the Dwarf rework that dropped together with Thorek Ironbrow, they went from terrible in Single Player to a pretty good choice for the early game, since you can now recruit them anywhere as long as your grudge meter is up. It also makes unlimited Slayer Doomstacks lead by Ungrim Ironfist a terrifying sight to behold.
**'''Dragonback Slayers'''(ROR): Slayers with better MA & MD, and they get physical resistance on top of the shield defense. The real value comes with their passive that activates in melee, it gives them fire damage, fire resistance, and applies slow debuff and the flammable trait for weakness to fire (doesn't stack if the enemy already has the flammable trait, but will stack with other effects of a different name that reduce fire resistance). The physical resist, slow debuff and the combo of fire damage and flammable debuff makes this unit a generally better pick over vanilla slayers, note that they do not get the fire resistance outside of combat so getting hit by flaming missiles outside of combat will hurt, the lore of fire spells are still subject to dwarf magic resistance though.
*'''Giant Slayers''': These are just super slayers, too costly to run a lot of. They will instantly blend light cavalry units like Marauder Horsemen or Ellyrian Reavers that dare to charge them, not that you should be using them to counter these units, it's just funny to see happen. Giant Slayers are basically Ungrim Ironfist as many Dwarfs instead of one. What they don't kill will be pretty close to death. Cannon fodder might counter slayers, but Giant Slayers dish out enough melee damage that you only need to worry about elite infantry and high mass units charging them. More vulnerable to shooting as they don't get the missile defense that Slayers get, these guys are expensive but do the job. Not recommended as a staple unit in army builds due to their cost, but good to pick if you're against monster or cavalry heavy armies.
*'''Hammerers''': Your well-armored, AP Damage dealing elite Dwarfs, not the same tank as a Longbeard but will deal serious AP damage. They've been reworked in the latest game, giving them substantially more health and magical(!) damage, meaning they're your best chance against Daemons and Treekin. **Still the same weaknesses as before, though: they're a Hammer (heh) in an Army of Anvils, so they'll mostly be pushing their way through your infantry
**Peak Gate Guard(ROR): The ultimate anti-armor unit, they go through heavily armored units like swordsmen through skavenslaves and then let other Dawi also participate in the fun.

===Ranged Infantry===
*'''Thunderers''': Like Empire handgunners, but you don't need to babysit them as much. A very useful unit even in the lategame that won't break the bank.
*'''Irondrakes:''' Where the fun begins. Ridiculously high damage output, solidly armoured. Need positioning to work right, but will absolutely demolish anything that you point them at. Their flamethrowers are considered artillery so they cannot be blocked by shields and inflict morale penalty upon anything they hit. They are surprisingly strong in melee against infantry if not deployed in a thin line because the back row can use their flamethrowers at point-blank, but not against cavalry as they'll pierce till the back row.
**'''The Skolder Guard'''(ROR): Replaces Lava for Steam to be an anti-armor unit. Much tougher than an Irondrakes with Physical resistance which is nice to have when the enemy gets a sneaky charge. They will multch full-plate units quickly given they have an even faster reload speed but watch out as you will also burn through their limited ammunition just as quickly. Against enemies with less armor you're better off using regular Irondrakes.
*'''Irondrakes (Trollhammer Torpedo)''': the Anti large version of the Irondrakes, having rocket launchers instead of Flamers. Often times Irondrakes can just melt through the armor of most things they are pointed at, sometimes they are Cavalry or monsters that have enough armor to shrug off that current of magma. Unlike regular Irondrakes they can shoot over units and obstacles. Don't be fooled by how their torpedoes explode, they don't do splash damage and should only attack infantry if you don't have anything bigger to shoot.

===Combined Infantry===
*'''Quarrellers''': Boring but practical. Like dwarf warriors, they're able to trade shots with the tier 1 ranged units of pretty much every other faction and winning because they come with shields on top of their dwarf armor. They also come with armor piercing, which makes them a budget option for shooting stuff like chaos warriors. However, they do less DPS per gold spent than similar units like empire crossbowmen and darkshards.
**As mentioned above, Thorek brings out the best in these guys, keeping them very relevant even to the late game. The shield variant is best used against missile-heavy factions like Wood Elves, but does nothing against Artillery.
*'''Quarrellers (Great Weapons)''': Similar to Quarrelers, except they give up shields in exchange for armor-piercing melee weapons. Won't win much in close combat, but they'll take down more enemies before they're overwhelmed, particularly against squishy units like harpies.
**Thorek buffs them to an insane degree to the point that when combined with all the relevant campaign bonuses, Quarrelers will become the core of your army. They're still not a frontline since they only have so many models in a unit, but 6-10 of these guys can outright delete anything that gives your Longbeards and Ironbreakers a hard time (Mammoths, stonehorns, even Rogue Idols). They also autoresolve very well, taking more losses than the shielded variant, but will take less losses than your frontline infantry.
*'''Miners (Blasting Charges)''': take that Cheap miner, then give them a single volley for bomb-throwing. Each model only gets one bomb, so make it count. Turn off ''Fire at Will'' and select the targets manually. A well-thrown Blasting Charge will decimate most charging infantry.
**'''Ekrund Miners'''(ROR): A regiment that Gets 3 Blasting Charges instead of 1. Depending on how well you managed them, that's paying less gold then recruiting 3 Blasting Charge Miners which matter very much in the gold restricted multiplayer.
*'''Ironbreakers''': The fact that Ironbreakers are one of the toughest units in the game would make them a key part of a Dawi late game army. Add to that blasting charges and you have something which can stomp most other infantry into the ground, blowing away a quarter of their hitpoints and ruining their charge before finishing off the survivors. Their only downside is that their damage in hand to hand is not that great, but that's what thunderers, slayers and artillery is for. NEVER let artillery, including artillery towers, target them. They're so slow they're target practice and they're no.1 priority as dwarfs don't have anything bigger.
**'''Norgrimlings Ironbreakers''':(ROR) Even better Ironbreakers, With bigger model size (so more bombes and unit health), a faster throwing arm, Vanguard, and Immune to Psychology. Overall a more powerful unit that can holds back the hords for longer while dealing more casualties.
*'''Rangers''': Sneaky Dwarf Quarrellers getting Vanguard and Stalk for a surprise Dwarf ambush. They have better speed to help with positioning and catching enemies at least when compared to other Dawi. They're armour is pretty good for most armies, but among Dwarfs they're on the lower end of defenses.
*'''Rangers (Great Weapons)''': Ranger equivalent of Quarrellers(Great Weapons) with one key difference; unlike the great weapon Quarreler the Rangers give up their crossbows entirely in favor of shorter ranged, higher AP throwing axes. Surprise AP flanking is a thing any Dwarf list could ask for. Keep in mind that each dwarf only carries 8 axes, so they'll run out much quicker than other rangers. Once they run out of throwing axes they become a decent anti-armour skirmishing unit, although their low defense means they need to chose their opponents carefully.
**'''Ulthar's Raiders'''(ROR) a unit your should be more careful with than just normal Rangers with Great Weapons, as they get the [[Witch Hunter]]'s ability to Mark a unit for death. You do get a fair amount of range despite having only infantry speed, being able to strip an enemy of a lot of their protection they had against ranged weapons. Good take if your using a Focus fire strategy, assuming your can keep the Raiders safe while making back their cost.
*'''Bugman's Rangers''' Surprisingly not a ROR. Improved Rangers, having the regenerative and drunkenness properties of Bugman's liquid courage. they are better at fighting off harassers while their improved shooting and HP recovery help them win archer fights. These are to Rangers as Longbeards are to Warriors: a straight upgrade assuming you can afford it. In MP, they can last longer without support and work best if you're good at micro. If not, you're probably better just leaving them at home in favor of more units of regular rangers.

===Cavalry===
Does not exist. See Slayers, Rangers and Air Units if you want something fast, you beardling.

===Artillery===
*'''Bolt Thrower:''' Your cheaper anti-large Artillery. More accurate and shoots faster than a cannon, but outclassed by them in splash and penetration power. Best used to take out elite cavalry and monsters in the early campaign.
*'''Grudge Thrower''': Your first artillery unit. Fills a role like an Empire Mortar as a long-range anti-infantry weapon giving it has the largest radius of splash damage on impact.
**'''Gob-Lobber (Grudge Thrower)(ROR)''': Like the Grudge Thrower, but better. Also has live Goblins bolted to the projectiles. Causes morale penalties to targets, which stacks with the penalty for being hit by artillery.
*'''Cannon:''' Your classic artillery. Slow to fire but harder to dodge, best used as an Anti-large weapon while also killing models in high armor units, through can have difficulties hitting if the enemy zigzags too much like most Artillery units.
*'''Organ Gun:''' An effective horse begone tool, with good armor piercing and a ton of cannon balls flying everywhere, cavalry will quickly and efficiently die off in droves as your foe rages, if there’s no cav to shoot, then this thing is good for pulping infantry and can do a decent job at eliminating chariots.
*'''Flame Cannon''' Jack-of-all-trades artillery. Great area damage to deal with blobs of infantry and while it doesn't cause AP damage, its base damage is high enough that it doesn't matter. Funny enough, its stats make it much better at breaking towers and walls than cannons.

===Air Units===
The closest thing to "cavalry". Flying Bombers. Fill a role as the fast-moving guns to shoot at enemy flanks and drop anti-infantry bombs. The rotor blades can also dish out a good amount of melee damage, but having almost no melee defense makes them relatively fragile despite having high armor. They are often safe in the air, but keep them away from other flyers and AP missiles. Despite this, they are absurdly fast having speed in the 200s to run from most problems (only Pegasus Knights or Hawk Riders could catch them without nets or debuffs). To use effectively will require some mico.

*'''Gyrobomber:''' Your dedicated bomber which sacrifices other aspects to be the best at that. As a single mobile unit dedicated to hovering over infantry to drop annihilating bombs multiple times during a game, they obviously require the most micromanagement. A well placed carpet bombing can absolutely devastate the enemy frontline, and its machine gun can put out Ratling-Gun levels of DPS on a much more mobile platform.
Important to note that on small unit scale, the gyrobombers bombs are not reduced in damage, so one gyrobomber becomes an army-shredding machine on that unit scale, and putting 2-3 or even more in every army will be an auto-win for the campaign
**'''Skyhammer(ROR)''': Drops cluster bombs, so be aware that the damage-area is greater than the marker shows. Basically the Dwarfs answer to big aoe magic to obliterate chaff and elite units alike.
*'''Gyrocopter:''' Your anti-infantry skirmishers, shooting and bombing out those enemy gunners and artillery that thought themselves safe so far in the back. Also good at harassing the harassers that thought they could run a circle around the slowly pivoting Dawi gun lines.
*'''Gyrocopter (Brimstone Gun):''' Switches from general anti-infantry to majority AP damage to harass and focus down targets with more armor. Generally speaking, superior in almost every way to regular Gyrocopters. Fire damage puts a serious dent in units with regeneration (and Wood Elves) and the lower base damage is neglible when you take AP into consideration.

==Tactics==
===Multiplayer Strategies===
Dwarfs are one of the most unique factions in the game battle wise, with an utter lack of mobility and magick, and focusing everything on tanky infantry that can deal decent damage, and powerful guns and artillery. Unfortunately for them, this uniqueness means that unless you're fighting other Dwarfs, you don't have any balanced match ups against other races. Against some you have a clear, obvious advantage and tend to stomp, and against others, they give you swirlies in the bathroom for your lunch money. This is why most competitive players think they're one of the best counterpick factions as you can avoid your bad match ups and play in a favorable situation. Anyway, here's how you can satisfy the grudge against the other races:

*'''Beastmen''': A rush faction, Beastmen will have a hell of a time against you, if you play your cards right. Their complete lack of armor leaves them quite vulnerable to Thunderer fire on the approach and Bolt Throwers can slice through Minotaurs and Cygors with relative ease. Keep a solid screen of staunch Dwarf Warriors between your ranged units and the enemy and bring (Giant) Slayers to turn the Bestigor and Centigor Herds into ground beef.

*'''Bretonnia''': The peasantry of the Bretonnians can safely be ignored (except Foot Squires, after their buffs they can actually fuck you up pretty good), as they'll struggle to do anything to your heavy armor. Instead, you'll want to focus on bringing down their armored cavalry, particularly the Grail Knights and Grail Guardians leading the charges into you. Trollhammer Irondrakes serve fantastically as a powerful Horse-B-Gone tool and your Giant Slayers can chunk through most of their cavalry so long as they're not the ones receiving the initial charge. Bolt Throwers are, again, a powerful tool to use while the Bretonnian cav is on the approach. Just make sure that you keep your flanks thoroughly secure.

*'''[[Total_War_Warhammer/Tactics/Chaos_Dwarfs| Chaos Dwarfs]]''': Here's the thing about the Dawi-Zharr: their Dwarf units are generally better than yours one-on-one but are far more expensive. You can fill the field with heavily armored and relatively cheap infantry while they have to fill it with greenskin slaves.As a result your army as a whole has better staying power than theirs. Your Thunderers in particular are much cheaper than Fireglaives and have better range than Blunderbusses. Chaos Dwarf artillery can pose a big problem as you are pretty stationary and that's what they love but your cannons get a lot more shots per unit than theirs do and if you play your cards right you can win artillery duels. Watch out for Magma Cannons however, as the burning vortex their shots leave behind can really mess up an artillery crew - focus them down first if possible. Chaos Dwarfs also have lots of big monsters and chariots which will be a problem for you just as they always are. Your best bet is to shoot them down ASAP and if all else fails have a few Slayers in reserve. Gryrobombers can do pretty good against clumped Chaos Dwarf elite infantry and have a place in this matchup.

*'''Daemons of Chaos''': Expect Khorne Furies and a mostly Slaanesh-roster. see Slaanesh's guide below on how to deal with this. The good news is that since daemons of Chaos don't have access to greater daemon lords, you 'might' be able to deal with their hero-class lords. But this is mostly a full pain matchup for you, due to the access to the Slaanesh-roster daemons have.

*'''Chaos Warriors''': For Grungni's sake, keep your distance! Chaos Warriors are as tough as you are and hit harder in melee. Stock up on Thunderers and cannons, and bring some great weapon fighters to finish them off. Slayers can help as long as you're careful to make sure the enemy can't hit back. Keep your eyes out for flanking cavalry and chariots, and pray to the gods you can shoot those heathens before they reach your lines!

*'''Dark Elves''': This is a really tricky matchup for you; Dark Elves are fast and bring absurd AP damage in melee and at a range. Your biggest advantage is your superior range and you'll need to lean on it heavily to stand a chance. Grab cannons, Grudge Throwers, Rangers, and Quarrelers and hope to Grungi you can shoot them down before they get close enough to return the favor.

*'''Dwarfs''': Hopefully you have a general idea on the strengths of this faction, you're playing as them! Anti-Armor, full stop. Organ Guns, take the Skolder Guard and bring some Hammerers to crack open your opponent's can.

*'''Empire''': The Empire can be a tricky one because they're almost as good at artillery as you are while also having good cavalry and skirmishers. You'll need to stock up on gyrobombers to disrupt their flanking cavalry and Slayers to take out their knights. Irondrakes can also work well at deleting any aggressive demigryphs or knights. Beyond that, you should double down on your strengths and keep your artillery safe; the human lines will break before yours do.

*'''Greenskins''': As satisfying as it is to bury an axe in a greenskins skull, you are better off dealing with these guys from a distance. Quarrelers and Rangers are your friends here; quantity is as important as quality when fending off a green tide. Organ Guns and Cannons will be better at dealing with monsters than your Slayers, you don't want to send unarmoured units against Arachnarok Spiders or Rogue Idols. Don't forget your Irondrakes and/or your flame cannons, they can melt down anything from goblins to stone trolls. And keep your flanks protected from chariots and pump-wagons, they can wreak havoc on your lines and just ruin your day.

*'''Grand Cathay''': This is another instance of a faction that does what you do, only a hell of a lot worse. Yeah, you won't have to worry too much about these guys when they show up. Your missile boxes beat their missile boxes, their Cav is subpar and will get eaten by Slayers, and the only AP infantry that they have is Anti Large, which you don't have. Box up, get some cannons and Quarrelers, sit back and enjoy some Bugmans as the Cathayans desperately try to figure out how the fuck they're getting into your backline. Yes they do have their own little airforce, but do you really think Umgi inventions can compete with Dawi Gyrocopters? No. If they bring Sky Junks, send some Gyrocopters after them to pick them down. This faction might get more scary as DLC comes out, but for now this should be an easy win as long as you know what you're doing.

*'''High Elves''': Don't let the War of the Beard fool you, this will be one of your hardest match ups. High Elves have a lot of things that threaten you, but the things to fear the most would be their Chariots, Mages, White Lions and <s>Sisters of Averlorn</s> (they do magic damage so their AP isn't as useful as you think). Seriously, any High Elf player who knows what they're doing is going to spam White Lions and it is going to SUCK. Your best bet is to spam either Gyrocopters or Cannons and spread the field. Force the High Elves to have to either attack your artillery emplacements one at a time, allowing your others to fire freely, or use your air power and artillery to spread them apart and pick off pockets. Hammerers also have a niche in this match up, because they beat White Lions pretty hard one-on-one and with support from guns or chaff, they can go toe to toe with Swordmasters (Though don't count on that). Of course, these plans aren't perfect. There's a 99% chance they will bring Alarielle for Tempest and heals to deal with Gyros and they have plenty of mobility to get at your cannons to give the White Lions time to get in. Sadly, this is one of those match ups where even if you bring the most optimized Anti Elgi list possible, there's still a pretty decent chance you'll lose. Avoid this match up if you can.

*'''Khorne''': It's Khorne, c'mon. Warriors of chaos with somehow even less ranged and even killier once they reach your front lines. Bring plenty of armor-piercing infantry and ranged. If you want to live, protect your artillery from Khorne's furies and calvary.

*'''Kislev''': Kislev's big weakness is that their ranged firepower is also their melee power due to hybrid units, and while this seems great at first glance, they sacrifice both elements to have the other. Your artillery and ranged firepower will dump all over Kislev, your biggest concern are War Bears and Sleds, to which you should apply Slayers. Focus down the wizards and you'll out-brutalize Kislev in good time.

*'''Lizardmen''': Lizardmen are a bit of a mixed bag. On one hand, you can scoff at all the Skinks as they ping impotently off of your armor (unless they're the Red-Crested variety). On the other, Saurus are just as stubborn as you are and will take days to chew through without good AP. Bring some Hammerers to eek out an advantage in the inevitable grindfest you'll end up in. Take advantage of the Lizardmen's dearth of ranged firepower and massacre their forces with Irondrakes and Thunderers, while your Dwarf Warriors hold their front line at bay. You have excellent anti-monster units in the form of your Giant Slayers who absolutely will butcher any big dinosaur thrown into your ranks so long as you have some chaff to help trap and soak the damage the beasties can toss about. Though Skinks will largely prove a minor nuisance at best to a majority of your forces, you will ''definitely'' want to screen your (Giant) Slayers from the Skirmishing variety. Key players to watch out for are going to be the Slann Mage-Priests, Skink Priests and Kroxigors. Slann, especially fire/high Slann and Heavens Skink Priests can wreak utter havoc upon your forces with the myriad of vortex spells they can toss out, like candy from a parade float and they should absolutely be prioritized if you find them on the field. (Sacred) Kroxigors, if fielded, are surprisingly vicious anti-infantry monsters and will bowl over a majority of the infantry they're pointed at. Giant Slayers and Trollhammer Irondrakes serve as a solid counter, but you'll still want to swamp the Kroxigors in chaff to mitigate the damage they deal in turn.

*'''Norsca''': This is an easy fight for you. All of that monster hunting anti-large equipment the Norscans bring is going to fly right over your head as you bury your axes in their unarmoured pecs. Bring plenty of Cannons and Bolt Throwers to shoot down enemy Mammoths and bring some Irondrakes to shoot down anything else. Norscans are usually unarmoured, so you can trade your Thunderers for Quarrelers for the better range. Stick to the basics and you'll do fine.

*'''Nurgle''': Holy shit, a faction that might actually be slower than you! And it seems like you will have a hefty advantage as they don't really have a lot of ways to stop your artillery. The biggest thing you will probably have to worry about is their air force, and Furies and Rotflies will be gunning for that back line. Keep some Slayers near your guns, and get ready to surround them if they try to land. After that you just got to deal with Nurgle's rush of Plaguebearers and Nurglings, and I hope you're ready for nothing to ever die ever because that's likely what is gonna happen when Dawi and Nurgle clash. On the ground, Plague Toads and Pox Riders will likely be your biggest threat with their anti-infantry, but they're also big models, so guns and Slayers should do the trick. Expect a Herald as the commander, and if he's dumb enough to bring a Great Unclean One, laugh and shoot it to pieces. With the new debuffs fire damage does to healing, it might also be wise to break out the Irondrakes and Flame Cannons -- you'll have plenty of time to lob napalm at those shambling hordes of Plaguebearers.
** CoC DLC has brought some changes with access to marked WoC units for Nurgle; the units you will definitely see in this match-up now include Nurgle-marked Chaos Knights, Nurgle-marked Chaos Chariots, Nurgle-marked Chaos Warriors/Chosen with Great Weapons and Nurgle Marauder Horsemen with throwing axes. Knights & Chariots are especially a threat, as they will survive long enough from their speed+armour+Nurgle Mark to get behind your lines and wipe artillery or rear-charge your line infantry. Great weapon Warriors/Chosen, while still vulnerable to your guns when getting to your lines, are both units that have respectable chances of beating your units in the grind with their standard WoC stats, but now plus the Nurgle Mark. The Nurgle Warshrine is a strong support piece for the army, but like a GUO its something Dwarfs can delete so easily that you really should not see it. Generally expect Nurgle armies facing you to have a decent share of Nurgle-marked Mortal units from WoC now, unless your opponent hates themselves.

*'''Ogre Kingdoms''': This match is either gonna be your easiest or your hardest, as this comes down to the skill of you, the Ogre player, and what units you brought to the table. The Ogres have massive charge bonuses, but a lot of your units have charge defense, however unlike other factions, the Ogres will only lose half due to their Ogre Charge trait. The biggest threat the Ogres bring to you is their artillery, and if you leave them be they'll reap a devasting toll on your infantry. The good news is, that with the exception of Leadbelchers, all their artillery are a single model. Have your Cannons and Gyrocopters focus them down and you are good to go, or so you would think. Besides the Gnoblars, Ogres are all monster units, which means two things. One is that your artillery and Slayers will have a field day, but two is that their shockingly fast speed means they're gonna out run you and try to outmaneuver you at every opportunity. Your army should be a good balance of Longbeards, or if you are pinching pennies, Dwarf Warriors, they all have charge defense and can help hold the charging balls of lubber back. This is one of the match up where having a ton of Slayers is a good thing, and stack up on them to defend your back lines and cut the Ogres down to size. Your artillery should consist of two, maybe three Cannons to take out artillery and thin their numbers. Irondrakes with Trollhammer Torpedoes won't be a bad call, but they're on the pricey end. Besides some of their units, bring at least two, or simply one unit of Thunderers at most, because a lot of their stuff is unarmored, your main missile troop should be Quarrelers, they're cheap and will have a good time turning Ogres into pin-cushions and are strong enough to fend off Sabertusks. Your artillerys targeting priority should look something like this: artillery units (Ironblasters first, then Leadbelchers), Stonehorns, and finally, everything else. This should be the only match up where you shouldn't bother bringing Miners with Blasting Charges. The only thing they'll have an effect on is Gnoblars and strictly that, which is a waste of cash and will earn you a grudge for being wasteful. Now get out there and strike out some grudges agaisnt the fat bastards!

*'''Skaven''': This is probably the closest we'll get to a 40k-esque matchup (you know, <strike>aside the irony of neither the [[Squats|Dwarfs]] or Skaven being in that setting</strike> [[Leagues of Votann|The Kin has declared a Grudge against the manling who wrote that]]). Between your guns and artillery and their guns and artillery, most of the damage either of you will be dealing to each other will be done from afar. A majority of the Skaven infantry is quite helpless against your frontline infantry, but you'll have a hell of a time pinning anything down with the Skavens quicker movement speeds. Grudge Throwers are going to be king against most Skaven infantry builds, while Bolt Throwers or Cannons should be fielded to snipe any Warp-Lighting Cannons, Plagueclaw Catapults or Hellpit Abominations they have downfield. Warplock Jezzails will be a priority target to focus fire down, as are Warpfire Throwers and Poison Wind Globadiers, should they start getting too close. Aside utilizing their missile units against them, Skaven have absolutely no aerial presence, meaning your Gyrocopters will have virtually free reign to gun down rats at will.

*'''Slaanesh''': A bad day for you all around. It's become apparent, that if you're unlucky enough to run into Slaanesh, you're going to want to forego ranged firepower almost entirely, Miners with Blasting Charges and Ironbreakers will trade efficiently, maybe a safety pick of Thunderers to deal with a Keeper Of Secrets, but AP on everything, Furies, Spawn and chariots will just pulverize your formations in one of the most one-sided setups in the game right now.

*'''Tomb Kings''': The good news is that Tomb Kings don't like fire, and you have fire aplenty. Brimstone Gun-equipped Gyrocoptors are your fastest fire-delivery system, but Irondrakes and Flame Cannons are useful as well. The bad news is, that you don't like chariots, and they have chariots aplenty. Use every trick you can to soften up the chariots before they hit your lines; but it's unlikely you'll be able to stop them all. Grab some Giant Slayers to finish off the ones that survive your barrage and hope it's enough to keep them down. Tomb Kings infantry is no match for you, so you should build your army against their monsters and chariots.

*'''Tzeentch''': Ooh, here is somebody that's going to hate you. Tzeentch units are squishy and their ranged units only have middling range and are better for kiting. He also has no artillery other than Soul Grinders, few big monsters outside of Lords of Change, and relies heavily on spamming spells to activate their army abilities. Bring a Runelord or Thorek on an Anvil of Doom and laugh as their casters explode. Otherwise, pound them into dust with artillery, as they have few answers to an army with better range than them. Just guard the back line against Furies and Doom Knights and don't bother with air units, they'll get shot down in short order.

*'''Vampire Coast''': The most common Vampire Coast strategy is to bunker up with a large number of cheap ranged units and heavy artillery. If that sounds familiar, it's only because it's the same thing you like to do, you're just better at it. Bring plenty of Cannons and some Slayers to deal with the enemy monsters (hint: kill the Necrofex Colossi first). Once the big monsters have been dealt with, the pirates are basically just an inferior version of you, clumps of Quarrelers and Thunderers are plenty to take down the Zombies. And remember not to bunker up too tightly; you may have magic resistance but Winds of Death will still hurt.

*'''Vampire Counts''': Virtually nothing that makes up the rank and file of the Vampire Counts will pose a significant threat to you. Skeletons and Zombies will only serve to slow down your already plodding advance and only deal any meaningful "damage" to you simply by sponging your limited ranged firepower meant for something else. The only standard units that you'll find yourself at a significant disadvantage against will be the Cairn and Hex Wraiths, given your general lack of magical damage. You'll want to engage them with missile attacks for maximum effect and make sure that you are braced for their charges. The main thing you should be focused on taking down will be the Lords and Heroes leading the army; without them, the undead hordes will quickly fall apart (literally). They also pose the single biggest threat to everything you have, as their Lore of Death casters can delete swathes of your army with a single well placed cast if you are positioned carelessly.

*'''Wood Elves''': Wood Elves are an extremely annoying foe who are fundamentally the exact opposite of you. Their infantry can run circles around yours and they can deal frightening amounts of damage against their intended targets, but you'll snap their twiggy spines if you whip 'em with your beards. In general, you're going to be engaged in a very tedious game of "keep away", where the Wood Elves are going to be dancing just outside of your reach while their Glade Guard and Waywatchers pepper you with AP arrows and occasionally test your flanks for weaknesses via Wild Rider/Great Stag Knight cycle charges. Fortunately, you do have a couple tools the elves don't: Artillery. Grudge Throwers excel against WE infantry and can discourage them from trying to camp too far away, while Bolt Throwers and Flame Cannons will make mince-meat of the cavalry/Forest Spirits that may try to break through your lines. Speaking of Forest Spirits, Irondrakes will ''incinerate'' them. Slayers also help against the bigger tree spirits in theory, but the ranged power the Wood Elves bring make them a dicey proposition. As far as their melee infantry options are concerned, the only ones that majorly threaten you are the Bladesingers; their anti-armor magical attacks will scythe through your armor will jaw-dropping speed. Use Thunderers to soften them up on the charge then use Slayers to cut them down swiftly.

===Domination===
General Tier Rank: '''F'''

You are just SO FUCKING SLOW. You opponent is going to get to the point first, no question about it and most armies have plenty of ways to roadblock you in order to stop you from getting on them. While few factions will be able to contest you in a head on charge for the midpoint, once they start going for the side points you will have no way to out contest them. Important to note that there are some maps that you won't get completely dumpstered automatically. The more choke points that are on a map, the better it is for you because then the enemy will be more forced to try to take you head on instead of just avoid direct contact with you in an attempt to cap more points. However, even then there's no way you can outmaneuver your enemy unless they fall asleep at their computer out of boredom. Don't play Dwarfs in Domination until they get some major buffs, a DLC, or rework that will help them move around the map better.

However if you still decide to stay committed to playing dwarfs, the general tip is seize two caps at least and have a squadron of gyrocopters and bombers to harass the foe, ironbreakers are king here, jam them on a point and laugh as your opponent struggles to get them off, rangers and miners are key here as they are the only units with vanguard deployment (this includes the ROR ironbreakers) to delay the foe by brawling with them as your slower units get into position or to reinforce your troops if needed, slayers are necessary here as besides gyrocopters, their the fastest thing you got, bring along 3, 4 if needed, to both delete cav or monsters too big for their britches and do aforementioned delaying tactics, for artillery, on smaller maps, organ guns and flame cannons will be an excellent infantry/cavalry begone tool for clearing out points that are infested with enemy troops, as per the norm, bring a cannon to deal with enemy artillery and snipe monsters regardless of the map size, on longer maps, the grudge-thrower will be a much better alternative for clearing out points, but organ guns and flame cannons are a good deterrent for defending points, as they’ll delete blobs, just make sure there safe from enemy cav and flyers, however the one weakness as listed above, is your slowness, you need to be smart if you want to consistently win domination as dwarfs, assume a box formation as units in said shape, turn about faster and thus let them react to threats flanking around or move to different points faster if it’s necessary (keep in mind, it does not increase movement speed, it just hastens how fast they turn), while it is vulnerable to artillery fire, your cannons should already be firing at said artillery, follow this guide somewhat well and proceed to wipe every smug grin off with an axe, show every YouTuber good or otherwise how wrong they were as you strike out grudges and get vengeance for every domination tier list that put you in F tier!

===Campaign Strategies===
*'''Karaz-A-Karak''': Karaz-A-Karak starts out with a solid base economy and a protected position, with your flanks covered by minor dwarven factions and only one Greenskin faction as your initial enemy. However, that start is deceivingly simple at first; once Grimgor and Queek get going, your position will become increasingly precarious if you're not careful. Your biggest weakness is easily your very slow growth, as the Greenskins and Skaven often will have higher tier units much sooner than you do. Making the jump from Tier 3 to 4 as soon as you can is your top priority. Once your scary lategame units arrive, you can start to dominate the Southlands and expand in any direction you damn please.
**'''Pick Gronbrimdal (Mortal Empires only)''': There is no reason to ever pick Thorgim over Grombrindal as your starting LL. Grombrindal comes with a much better selection of starting units (Gyrocopters, Irondrakes and Thunderers) and his blue skill tree might be one of the most blatantly overpowered things in the game on its own, as Grombrindals variants of the perks not just affect his army, but your entire faction. Thorgrim can be recruited later down the line regardless.
**'''Don't get bogged down''': The initial 50 turns of any campaign might just be called "get ready for Grimgor". While you can expand quickly at the start, it is ill advised (and very tempting) to stray too far from your Capital and end up with your armies battering against your starting enemies while Grimgor happily carves a path straight towards Karaz-A-Karak. Losing Karaz-A-Karak becomes a win condition in this case; if you can successfully defend it, the Greenskins are finished, if you lose it, you can restart a new campaign.

'

*Clan Angrund''' In immortal empires Belegar's difficulty level has been severely reduced, on turn one as soon as you take your first settlement you can full-confederate Karak Izor instantly. After that it's the usual hop and skip to Karak-Eight-Peaks, however with it in Skarsnik's hands now, it's significantly easier to take as Skarsnik doesn't start with a full 20 stack army unlike the 'Crooked Moon Mutineers' from Warhammer 2.
[[Category:Total Warhammer]] {{Total War Warhammer Tactics}}

Total War Warhammer/Tactics/Dwarfs

2023-06-12T16:52:55Z

2A02:1810:4E2C:A900:DC0E:597F:F427:CBEB: /* Generic Lords */

{{Topquote|Kazukhan-kazakit-ha! (Look out, the Dwarfs are on the warpath!)|Game battle chant for Dwarfs, if you think about it, it should be look <s>down</s> THAT'S A GRUDGE!}}
This is the tactics page for the Total War: Warhammer version of The Dwarfs.

==Why play Dwarfs?==
*Because you want to sit and watch as your enemies are blasted away while coming towards you.
*Cause you're under 5'5 and want '''vengeance''' for all the short jokes.
*You don't want to do too much micro, so an army without much in the way of mobility and cavalry doesn't bother you as much.
*You enjoy having infantry that won't die after being slapped by a wet noodle.
*Slay everything without a beard!!
*FLAMETHROWERS!!!

===Pros===
*'''Durability''': You are a tank faction. Most of your units are categorized with high armour, melee defense and leadership. Even your tier one and chaff are very tanky compared to counterparts from other factions. This is further supplemented by the innate magic resist many of your units have, which ''slightly'' compensates for your otherwise complete lack of magic. Additionally, with their naturally high leadership, dwarfs do not usually break unless hopelessly outnumbered or if you screw up massively by getting cavalry charged in the rear. Frankly, your units will hold out forever.
**Your magic resistance got nerfed in the third game to ''only'' resist magical spells. Still useful, but now units with magic attacks, I.E Daemons, are going to be way better at cracking you open.
*'''Range''': Guns, guns and more guns! Dwarfs have some of the best blackpowder units in the entire game. Thunderers and Cannons can lay a whooping on anything they are firing on, and their artillery isn't anything to sneer at. Even their non-AP range units are very good for their price, and it's not hard for them to earn their points back as long as they are defended.
*'''If they get close, Nut 'em!''': As if being being one of the best factions at shooting was not enough, their missile units can also hold their own in close quarters better than most.
*'''Airforce''': Gyrocopters with their anti large can get you control over the air, and their ability to kite monsters into oblivion is a good skill to have. Even Gyrobombers have a niche for their blob killing capabilities after recent buffs.
*'''Runes''': Where other races rely on the fickle Winds of Magic, you have your reliable runes. Runes supply surprisingly good buffs and debuffs that can help your army out, making them a great way to make sure your infantry stays in the fight a bit longer. The fact that they aren't limited by a power reserve also means that they'll remain a viable option well into the latter stages of a fight, where other factions might begin to tap out of their mystical power.
*'''Anti-large''': You laugh when the enemy brings big monsters. With all your AP missiles, Anti Large artillery and slayers, you have the one of the easiest times killing monsters out of any faction in the game.
*'''Strong Economy''': It's campaign specific but yeah, it turns out the species who's renowned for being the best at making shit is also one of the best at making money. The resource building chains go up to level IV instead of stopping at level III, you can mass produce Dwarf Beer anywhere. Putting together Doomstacks of Top Tier Dawi troops is easier.
*'''Good for Beginners''': Everyone was just starting once, if you are new to Warhammer Total War or just Total War in general the Dawi are (ironically enough) forgiving. Something like the Wood Elves is fragile and has a limited margin for error, Dwarfs on the other hand have more of a fudge factor in most match ups. Not to say that it's easy mode playing dwarfs, but the likelihood of things going pear shaped in a second is lower.

===Cons===
*'''Lack of Mobility''': With no Cav, monsters and slow infantry, Dwarfs are the least mobile faction in the game. You will spend the majority of the game standing still.
*'''Lack of Magic''': Though your most recent rework makes your runes a damn good alternative, you don't really have magic. This can pose a problem when you face similarly physically durable armies in battle and lack a reliable, magical alternative for damage. Additionally, though you defensively have a 25% resistance to the arcane, many large vortex spells will still sting quite a bit and your complete lack of magical healing means it'll be hard to bounce back from the damage you do take.
*'''Chariots''': Chariots are the bane of a Dwarf players existence. They don't have any real way to lock them down and, as you'd expect, AP anti infantry can really kill what the Dwarfs want to do on the battlefield. Due to the rework to how bracing and knock down works, this isn’t as bad as before, but chariots can still be a problem
*'''Predictability''': Most veteran players know what's going to happen when Dwarfs are picked. They are going to go for a cheap, numerous and sturdy front line and a lot of guns and artillery. This means that Dwarfs are easy to plan for as they only have one real viable tactic. Building an army around fighting Dwarfs is something players from all races know how to do.
*'''Lack of Good Lord Options''': Do you like the Runelord or Thorek? No? Well you better start because in multiplayer they're your only viable options. Grombrindal is an ok duelist but honestly Dwarf lords in general kind of suck. With no mounts and no way to stick to their targets it's hard for them to get anything done. This problem got better with the Twisted and the Twilight due to the changes to knockdown effects, but sticking to targets will still be hard
*'''Hard campaign''': With all the changes to the factions around them, the Dawi have fallen on some pretty hard times. The lifetime of WH2 dotted the landscape around Karaz-A-Karak alone with a huge number of guaranteed enemies that you will have to look out for, with your most reliable allies in the Empire being very far away. The other subfactions don't fare much better and your slow growth seriously hurts your ability to expand, especially when compared with your most dominant enemies, the Greenskins of the Badlands and Clan Mors further down the road.
*'''Bad in Domination''': Turns out your stubby little legs makes it really hard for you to capture objectives. Due to your lack of mobility you can't effectively capture points since other factions can just out race you to them and get more units on them. As such, you're widely considered the weakest faction in Domination.
*'''DLC''': A con for everyone, but fortunately you get off easier than many others. Unfortunately, a couple of your best units, namely Runelords and Rangers, are in fact locked behind DLC and if you want to really use your Dwarfs to the fullest, you'll need to pay the toll.

==Universal Traits==

*'''The Great Book of Grudges''': The fact that the sacred Dammaz Kron went unmentioned on this pages for so long merits an entry on its own. The Book of Grudges documents every slight committed against your faction, including legendary grudges that you start out with. Whenever something bad happens, i.e. you lose a settlement, get raided or a hostile faction repeatedly trespasses on your turf without you allowing it, it merits an entry in the book. These entries can (and will) accumulate over time, and depending on how much your Dorfs disliked the transgression, will vary in severity, which fills up a meter that gives you some penalties and some bonusses. High severity from unresolved Grudges gives you minor public order and research speed penalties, but it also gives all of your armies a charge bonus (since the Dwarfs are so pissed off) and increases the chance of Slayers and Giant Slayers popping up in your Regiments of Renown pool, where they can then be recruited instantly into your armies. Resolving Grudges and Legendary Grudges (such as retaking Karak Eight Peaks as Belegar Ironhammer) also earns you powerful bonusses (money, Oathgold, small buffs for the entire faction ) and special Runes.
*'''Oathgold''': The secondary resource of the Dwarfs. Practically identical to the Mortuary Cult of the Tomb Kings, with the key difference being that the Dwarfs can make much more stuff with Oathgold and that the stuff is much more abundant. Oathgold is earned through resolving Grudges, doing missions and quests, Gold Mines and some special buildings such as the Brightstone Mine in Mount Gunbad. Oathgold, combined with trade goods, can be used to create items for your Lords and Heroes, which makes it downright trivial to kit out every single character on the map with some special gizmos to make them really powerful. Oathgold can also be used to make Character and Banner Runes, the former can be applied as equipment to individual characters (with up to 3 individual runes at maximum), the latter functions like Banners that you can give units to give them special bonusses and abilities.
*'''Expert Charge Defense''': Barring Slayers, every single one of your units has Expert Charge Defense, which nullifies charge bonusses and also the momentum of units charging into your staunch line of angry Dwarfs.
*'''Magic Resistance''': Every Dwarf has a built in 25% Magic Resist (Spell Resist in WH3). Consult the main page for WHFB Dwarfs as to why.

==Legendary Lords and Subfactions==
*'''Thorgrim Grudgebearer:''' The high king himself, and the only large non-war machine unit in your roster, as he is carried on a massive throne sled by some burly dwarfs, Thorgrim isn't huge on offence, better than say mid-tier combat lords, but he's mostly just a hard to kill brick of leadership. Dwarfs in range of him just become slightly harder to break, which isn't saying much given their default morale, and he's not easily sniped. This results in him being kind of underwhelming, you know he's not going to die like a bitch, but you also know that he's not exactly going to recoup even a quarter of his cost. Is kind of safe in campaign play for beginners, but Grombrindal is overall superior. - Pass.
*'''Ungrim Ironfist:''' The Slayer King, bane of anything taller than six feet, Ungrim is the opposite of Thorgrim; all offence, with low defence. Ungrim is actually pretty good in terms of being a hero-killer and monster-hunter, he's not going to solo Tyrion or Kroq-Gar, and don't even think of monster lords like Kholek or monstrous mounts such as a Tomb King on a War Sphinx, without a unit to bog them down. The problem with Ungrim is that while he can throw hands and live up to his title, he eats a lot of damage for a Dwarf, or just in general for a combat Lord, he's easy to snipe with massed missiles if caught in the open, and while he can butcher most things sent his way, he'll only be able to do this once or twice in a battle before he's at serious risk of dying. Don't let that 120 armour & Unbreakable make you think he's a tank, Ungrim's Melee Defence is quite low for a combat lord, and that low dwarf speed means he can by kited to death. Thorgrim lacks the damage to recoup his cost, Ungrim lacks the defence to recoup his costs. If playing with an ally that has access to Lore of Life he can be kept alive, but you're asking a lot of resources to support the Slayer King. - Pass.
*'''Grombrindal:''' THE WHITE DWARF, Grombrindal doesn't bring anything really special to the table, he's a decent duelist, although lacking the balls-to-the-wall offence of Ungrim Ironfist, Grombrindal is nowhere near as risky for a combat Lord. The flashbomb ability can lockdown mobile Heroes and give the White Dwarf a few easy hits. Doesn't quite bring much for the rest of the army, but is the best Legendary Lord for cost-benefit tradeoffs. He can fight, he can survive, and he can make the entire army Unbreakable with a reusable map-wide buff. - Niche but competitive in that niche. In Campaign, he is easily the best LL the Dwarfs offer. His blue skill tree affects ''your entire faction'' and the four blessings you can choose every 20 turns (10 after picking a specific skill) are all very powerful, a whopping +25% Research Rate is no joke, as are +10 Melee Attack and Defense for every unit in Grombrindals army.
*'''Belegar Ironhammer:'''(DLC) Belegar is really just a wall, he's harder to kill than Thorgrim as they have comparable stats, but he has a silver shield for 55% missile resistance. That's all. Just an insanely hard to kill Lord, sure his offence isn't terrible, being better than Thorgrim's on base stats and a nice buff can be popped to go higher. But honestly you're paying a lot for a Lord that won't die, and generally speaking Dwarfs in Total War: Warhammer aren't a faction that is centred around their generals or Heroes. No real wizards to throw high-impact spell effects, no mobile Heroes that can exploit small gaps to flank units or hunt down supporting pieces like buffers, wizards or artillery crews. The only upshot to taking Belegar's subfaction in multiplayer is getting access the Ancestor Heroes who are damned hard to kill, but are also the only Dwarf units that are scared of magic damage, which can sort of be a mind-games thing because the default assumption to seeing Clan Angrund picked is that Ancestor Heroes are on the field, so grab some magic damage to delete them, but then seeing that there are no ghost Dwarfs means that the magic damage is actually a big waste considering all Dwarfs have 25% Magic Resistance. - Pass.
*'''Thorek Ironbrow:'''(FLC): With the rework comes a new LL and Thorek serves this role, being the latest (and most likely last) new contender in the Lustrian Thunderdome in the Vortex Campaign, and starting at the southernmost tip of the map in Karak Zorn on Mortal Empires. He serves as a supercharged Runelord with access to a unique mount that messes quite a bit with enemy spellcasting and improved Runic Magic on his own part. In the campaign, his legendary conservativeness translates into bonusses for "traditional" Dwarfen ranged units like Quarrelers and Grudge Throwers. Not to worry though, since he starts with a Rune of Burning that makes the Catapult projectiles [[Awesome|FUCKING EXPLODE]] and dramatically increases the combat value of Quarrelers in his own Army quite significantly (arguably making them even better than Thunderers). His campaign goal revolves around finding several lost Dwarfen artifacts, which can then be used to craft powerful buffs for your whole faction. [[Derp|He also can make enemy casters explode.]] - Best Multiplayer Lord pick.

==Units==
===Generic Lords===
*'''Dwarf Lord:''' No, just no, he suffers from the same issue that the Legendary Lords suffer from, being too slow. But wait there's more, the generic Lord is easier to kill in combat, provides less army support, and does less damage. He's not even the cheapest option to help save costs. I mean he has a shield, but its only bronze. Unless you've got some kind of bet riding on a battle and there's a specific stipulation that you cannot use any other Lord, screw the money because he's too crap. That said compared to generic foot Lords in other factions he's quite difficult to kill, which is more advice for fighting Dwarf Lords in campaign really. PASS!
*'''Runelord:''' (DLC) Yes, yes yes. The one competitive General in multiplayer, the Runelord is just a walking bubble of passive buffs that make your low tier units good, and your good infantry units even better. Has good active abilities, like Master Rune of Oath & Steel which gives +30 armour to all dwarfs in range, or the Rune of Speed which adds 45% speed and 24 melee attack to all dwarfs in range. This is the Lord pick that supports the Dwarf army, and don't think he's some kind of wizard that dies when someone looks at him funny, while the melee defence is low at 40, the Runelord has the same 120 armour as the other Lords, plus up to 35% missile resistance, sharing 20% of that with nearby allies. Slapping him on an Anvil of Doom gives a special ability that causes enemy casters to automatically miscast for minor damage when near him. TL;DR fucks magic, gets buffs. - Good if you want Thorek but a bit cheaper.

===Legendary Heroes (Clan Angrund Only)===
All [[Clan Angrund]] has such a strong relationship with their ancestors, they come back as ghosts. Like all ghosts, they have a 75% physical resistance instead of magic resistance, with magic attacks, Unbreakable, but no armor and less health than normal. They have Fear and Terror making them good at chasing the enemy off. They themselves are weak to magic attacks, but who takes that much offense magic against Dwarfs anyway?

*'''King Lunn Ironhammer:''' is one of the two ghost Thanes, being the offensive one, with slightly more Melee attack than a normal Thane.
*'''Halkenhaf Stonebeard:''' the other ghost Thane, being the most defensive of the par with significantly lower melee attack but a very high defense of 65 and silver shield, letting him minge with enemies for a protracted time to proc terror routs.
*'''Throni Ironbrow:''' Most likely to take as he is a Runesmith, so someone that needs protection while also being in the front lines.
*'''Dramar Hammerfist:''' the ghost engineer so paying extra for a harder to kill gun lines buffer and better at chasing away those that try to disrupt them.

===Heroes===
*'''Master Engineer:''' Basically a must if you're running more than 2 artillery pieces, buffs artillery, has a decent sniper rifle of his own, not great in a fight with anything beyond hound packs and light cavalry, so don't expect him to be an effective guard for the cannons he's buffing. However if there is another unit nearby casting Entrenchment right before they rout will make the unit hold the line and fight even after being routed. On campaign they also boost your army's mobility. Aaaaaand the Dwarf Rework happened, buffing him even further with the ability of the Vampirate Gunnery Wight to restore lost ammo to artillery pieces for up to five times. Just too good to miss out on if you're bringing a bunch of cannons (and who doesn't, honestly).
*'''Runesmith:''' Basically a squishier version of the Runelord, has many of the same buffs, both passive and active. With the Dwarf rework, these guys have gone from being merely decent to amazing. While utilizing a rune puts every other rune on a shared cooldown, this only applies per caster; having multiple Runesmiths allows you to stack multiple buffs simultaneously or across multiple units without having to wait out the full 60 second global cooldown. They might not necessarily be an auto-include persay, but having one or two of these guys in your army is strongly recommended.
*'''Thane:''' While they still suffer from being slow, Thanes can be used more aggressively than Legendary Lords. Kit them out with the Rune of Slowness to gimp enemy mobility, or give them the Ironbeard's Ring and coordinate with a source of fire damage: Flame Cannons, Dragonback Slayers, Warriors of Dragonfire Pass, basic Irondrakes, or Brimstone Gyrocopters, all of these will deal serious damage to units inside the debuff aura.

===Infantry===
*'''Miners''': The closest thing to cannon fodder in the Dwarf Roster, miners are cheap AP units. Also give "speed" and breadth to Dawi list by vanguarding.
*'''Dwarf Warriors''': Did you know that a unit of Dwarf Warriors costs 475 gold but can hold against 3 units of Empire Swordsmen, costing 400 gold each, for just over 2 minutes and racking up roughly 90-100 kills before dying/breaking? Dwarf Warriors aren't great, just good, and are very much just a shield wall frontline. Dwarf Warriors are very cost-effective starting units. They will trade positively against most infantry that are tier 1-3 excluding units with high AP values or anti-infantry buffs. Dwarf Warriors aren't the same as elite heavy infantry however, they will break in time, if rear charged, if attacked by great weapon units, if hit with leadership debuffs, or if attacked by characters. This is a unit that buys time for a unit in the second line to get in position to assist, do not assume you can just deploy them as a single line and have artillery sit safely behind them.
**'''Warriors of Dragonfire Pass'''(ROR): Slightly better warriors that deal fire damage in combat, not a guaranteed pick most of the time, but good against any faction that is vulnerable to fire, consider pairing with a Thane carrying Ironbeard's Ring to boost damage.
*'''Dwarf Warriors (Great Weapons)''': You know how Dwarf Warriors can hold frontlines for a time but need a second line unit to assist them, this is cheapest of the second line units. Regular warriors have shields, 40 Melee Defence, and charge defence against large units, Warriors with Great Weapons don't have those defences, they get armour piercing damage which is the kind of offence needed to make up for the vanilla warriors' shortcomings. Don't try and use them as a frontline unit, and replace them when you can with other melee infantry.
*'''Longbeards''': Warriors +1 really, they buff the leadership of other units (it's the generic Encourage passive so no stacking with Lords), so consider mixing them with warriors. Cost-wise your mostly paying for better Melee Defence, better Leadership, the leadership aura, and Immune to Psychology compared to vanilla Warriors. A common question is which is better for cost, Longbeards or Warriors, but outside of fighting undead armies that have tons of fear/terror effects, the answer to the question is; use both. While the differences between the two units are obvious in comparison, to the player on the other side of the battlefield it doesn't matter much because a Dwarf line is still a solid formation that is hard to break. Longbeards work good in the wings to buff leadership in the flanks, and having warrior units means you can save gold for more missile units and artillery.
*'''Longbeards (Great Weapons)''': While the difference between shield Warriors and shield Longbeards isn't much, the great weapon variant favours the Longbeards, which come with Charge Defense and Armor-Piercing (but no target specialization). In MP, where every gold coin counts, if all you need is cheap AP, take the Warriors, but if you want something tankier and able to encourage your dwarfs to hold out a bit longer, take these guys.
**'''The Grumbling Guard'''(ROR): Not too bad, stat wise its a bit more armour & melee attack, 10 more leadership, and 13 more Melee Defence, which puts them at a whopping 51 Melee Defence. You don't get any improved damage output with these guys, instead you get an ability that replenishes 9% of vigour for them and nearby allies. This may not sound like much, but fatigue debuffs are crippling for units, and Dwarfs rely on grinding things out so even a small vigour buff to some units is good even if it just moves them from exhausted to very tired. But wait, this ability has infinite uses and a low cooldown so spam it away. While Hammerers do the same job but better, the Grumbling Guard are fantastic for keeping Ironbreakers in better condition than their enemies.
*'''Slayers''': Slayers are kind of weird. They're unbreakable, quick (for a Dwarf), hit hard, and do a lot of damage with no consideration to survivability. This means that they can seriously fuck up higher-tier units but on the same time are vulnerable to cannon fodder. It does not matter if you're a crappy goblin with a crappy spear, it's getting through a Slayer's hide as much as a Chosen's Daemonforged Axe. When using Slayers, hold them back so that other units, especially ones with charge defense, take the brunt of the charge before moving the slayers to counter-attack, and while it might cost you the charge bonus, having them attack through the buffer unit really improves the lifespan of your slayers (Probably much to their chagrin). Note that if you ever leave them in the open, missile units just have to imagine shooting them to wipe the unit, which is an expensive mistake. Also a definite must take against vampire counts and Tomb Kings with all their fear effects but do not ever think about using them against Vampire Pirates because they will get shot to pieces before any fear/terror units get close for the unbreakable to matter. Also, leave them at home against Wood Elves, or if you have fore-knowledge that your opponent likes horse-archer tactics.
*With the Dwarf rework that dropped together with Thorek Ironbrow, they went from terrible in Single Player to a pretty good choice for the early game, since you can now recruit them anywhere as long as your grudge meter is up. It also makes unlimited Slayer Doomstacks lead by Ungrim Ironfist a terrifying sight to behold.
**'''Dragonback Slayers'''(ROR): Slayers with better MA & MD, and they get physical resistance on top of the shield defense. The real value comes with their passive that activates in melee, it gives them fire damage, fire resistance, and applies slow debuff and the flammable trait for weakness to fire (doesn't stack if the enemy already has the flammable trait, but will stack with other effects of a different name that reduce fire resistance). The physical resist, slow debuff and the combo of fire damage and flammable debuff makes this unit a generally better pick over vanilla slayers, note that they do not get the fire resistance outside of combat so getting hit by flaming missiles outside of combat will hurt, the lore of fire spells are still subject to dwarf magic resistance though.
*'''Giant Slayers''': These are just super slayers, too costly to run a lot of. They will instantly blend light cavalry units like Marauder Horsemen or Ellyrian Reavers that dare to charge them, not that you should be using them to counter these units, it's just funny to see happen. Giant Slayers are basically Ungrim Ironfist as many Dwarfs instead of one. What they don't kill will be pretty close to death. Cannon fodder might counter slayers, but Giant Slayers dish out enough melee damage that you only need to worry about elite infantry and high mass units charging them. More vulnerable to shooting as they don't get the missile defense that Slayers get, these guys are expensive but do the job. Not recommended as a staple unit in army builds due to their cost, but good to pick if you're against monster or cavalry heavy armies.
*'''Hammerers''': Your well-armored, AP Damage dealing elite Dwarfs, not the same tank as a Longbeard but will deal serious AP damage. They've been reworked in the latest game, giving them substantially more health and magical(!) damage, meaning they're your best chance against Daemons and Treekin. **Still the same weaknesses as before, though: they're a Hammer (heh) in an Army of Anvils, so they'll mostly be pushing their way through your infantry
**Peak Gate Guard(ROR): The ultimate anti-armor unit, they go through heavily armored units like swordsmen through skavenslaves and then let other Dawi also participate in the fun.

===Ranged Infantry===
*'''Thunderers''': Like Empire handgunners, but you don't need to babysit them as much. A very useful unit even in the lategame that won't break the bank.
*'''Irondrakes:''' Where the fun begins. Ridiculously high damage output, solidly armoured. Need positioning to work right, but will absolutely demolish anything that you point them at. Their flamethrowers are considered artillery so they cannot be blocked by shields and inflict morale penalty upon anything they hit. They are surprisingly strong in melee against infantry if not deployed in a thin line because the back row can use their flamethrowers at point-blank, but not against cavalry as they'll pierce till the back row.
**'''The Skolder Guard'''(ROR): Replaces Lava for Steam to be an anti-armor unit. Much tougher than an Irondrakes with Physical resistance which is nice to have when the enemy gets a sneaky charge. They will multch full-plate units quickly given they have an even faster reload speed but watch out as you will also burn through their limited ammunition just as quickly. Against enemies with less armor you're better off using regular Irondrakes.
*'''Irondrakes (Trollhammer Torpedo)''': the Anti large version of the Irondrakes, having rocket launchers instead of Flamers. Often times Irondrakes can just melt through the armor of most things they are pointed at, sometimes they are Cavalry or monsters that have enough armor to shrug off that current of magma. Unlike regular Irondrakes they can shoot over units and obstacles. Don't be fooled by how their torpedoes explode, they don't do splash damage and should only attack infantry if you don't have anything bigger to shoot.

===Combined Infantry===
*'''Quarrellers''': Boring but practical. Like dwarf warriors, they're able to trade shots with the tier 1 ranged units of pretty much every other faction and winning because they come with shields on top of their dwarf armor. They also come with armor piercing, which makes them a budget option for shooting stuff like chaos warriors. However, they do less DPS per gold spent than similar units like empire crossbowmen and darkshards.
**As mentioned above, Thorek brings out the best in these guys, keeping them very relevant even to the late game. The shield variant is best used against missile-heavy factions like Wood Elves, but does nothing against Artillery.
*'''Quarrellers (Great Weapons)''': Similar to Quarrelers, except they give up shields in exchange for armor-piercing melee weapons. Won't win much in close combat, but they'll take down more enemies before they're overwhelmed, particularly against squishy units like harpies.
**Thorek buffs them to an insane degree to the point that when combined with all the relevant campaign bonuses, Quarrelers will become the core of your army. They're still not a frontline since they only have so many models in a unit, but 6-10 of these guys can outright delete anything that gives your Longbeards and Ironbreakers a hard time (Mammoths, stonehorns, even Rogue Idols). They also autoresolve very well, taking more losses than the shielded variant, but will take less losses than your frontline infantry.
*'''Miners (Blasting Charges)''': take that Cheap miner, then give them a single volley for bomb-throwing. Each model only gets one bomb, so make it count. Turn off ''Fire at Will'' and select the targets manually. A well-thrown Blasting Charge will decimate most charging infantry.
**'''Ekrund Miners'''(ROR): A regiment that Gets 3 Blasting Charges instead of 1. Depending on how well you managed them, that's paying less gold then recruiting 3 Blasting Charge Miners which matter very much in the gold restricted multiplayer.
*'''Ironbreakers''': The fact that Ironbreakers are one of the toughest units in the game would make them a key part of a Dawi late game army. Add to that blasting charges and you have something which can stomp most other infantry into the ground, blowing away a quarter of their hitpoints and ruining their charge before finishing off the survivors. Their only downside is that their damage in hand to hand is not that great, but that's what thunderers, slayers and artillery is for. NEVER let artillery, including artillery towers, target them. They're so slow they're target practice and they're no.1 priority as dwarfs don't have anything bigger.
**'''Norgrimlings Ironbreakers''':(ROR) Even better Ironbreakers, With bigger model size (so more bombes and unit health), a faster throwing arm, Vanguard, and Immune to Psychology. Overall a more powerful unit that can holds back the hords for longer while dealing more casualties.
*'''Rangers''': Sneaky Dwarf Quarrellers getting Vanguard and Stalk for a surprise Dwarf ambush. They have better speed to help with positioning and catching enemies at least when compared to other Dawi. They're armour is pretty good for most armies, but among Dwarfs they're on the lower end of defenses.
*'''Rangers (Great Weapons)''': Ranger equivalent of Quarrellers(Great Weapons) with one key difference; unlike the great weapon Quarreler the Rangers give up their crossbows entirely in favor of shorter ranged, higher AP throwing axes. Surprise AP flanking is a thing any Dwarf list could ask for. Keep in mind that each dwarf only carries 8 axes, so they'll run out much quicker than other rangers. Once they run out of throwing axes they become a decent anti-armour skirmishing unit, although their low defense means they need to chose their opponents carefully.
**'''Ulthar's Raiders'''(ROR) a unit your should be more careful with than just normal Rangers with Great Weapons, as they get the [[Witch Hunter]]'s ability to Mark a unit for death. You do get a fair amount of range despite having only infantry speed, being able to strip an enemy of a lot of their protection they had against ranged weapons. Good take if your using a Focus fire strategy, assuming your can keep the Raiders safe while making back their cost.
*'''Bugman's Rangers''' Surprisingly not a ROR. Improved Rangers, having the regenerative and drunkenness properties of Bugman's liquid courage. they are better at fighting off harassers while their improved shooting and HP recovery help them win archer fights. These are to Rangers as Longbeards are to Warriors: a straight upgrade assuming you can afford it. In MP, they can last longer without support and work best if you're good at micro. If not, you're probably better just leaving them at home in favor of more units of regular rangers.

===Cavalry===
Does not exist. See Slayers, Rangers and Air Units if you want something fast, you beardling.

===Artillery===
*'''Bolt Thrower:''' Your cheaper anti-large Artillery. More accurate and shoots faster than a cannon, but outclassed by them in splash and penetration power. Best used to take out elite cavalry and monsters in the early campaign.
*'''Grudge Thrower''': Your first artillery unit. Fills a role like an Empire Mortar as a long-range anti-infantry weapon giving it has the largest radius of splash damage on impact.
**'''Gob-Lobber (Grudge Thrower)(ROR)''': Like the Grudge Thrower, but better. Also has live Goblins bolted to the projectiles. Causes morale penalties to targets, which stacks with the penalty for being hit by artillery.
*'''Cannon:''' Your classic artillery. Slow to fire but harder to dodge, best used as an Anti-large weapon while also killing models in high armor units, through can have difficulties hitting if the enemy zigzags too much like most Artillery units.
*'''Organ Gun:''' An effective horse begone tool, with good armor piercing and a ton of cannon balls flying everywhere, cavalry will quickly and efficiently die off in droves as your foe rages, if there’s no cav to shoot, then this thing is good for pulping infantry and can do a decent job at eliminating chariots.
*'''Flame Cannon''' Jack-of-all-trades artillery. Great area damage to deal with blobs of infantry and while it doesn't cause AP damage, its base damage is high enough that it doesn't matter. Funny enough, its stats make it much better at breaking towers and walls than cannons.

===Air Units===
The closest thing to "cavalry". Flying Bombers. Fill a role as the fast-moving guns to shoot at enemy flanks and drop anti-infantry bombs. The rotor blades can also dish out a good amount of melee damage, but having almost no melee defense makes them relatively fragile despite having high armor. They are often safe in the air, but keep them away from other flyers and AP missiles. Despite this, they are absurdly fast having speed in the 200s to run from most problems (only Pegasus Knights or Hawk Riders could catch them without nets or debuffs). To use effectively will require some mico.

*'''Gyrobomber:''' Your dedicated bomber which sacrifices other aspects to be the best at that. As a single mobile unit dedicated to hovering over infantry to drop annihilating bombs multiple times during a game, they obviously require the most micromanagement. A well placed carpet bombing can absolutely devastate the enemy frontline, and its machine gun can put out Ratling-Gun levels of DPS on a much more mobile platform.
Important to note that on small unit scale, the gyrobombers bombs are not reduced in damage, so one gyrobomber becomes an army-shredding machine on that unit scale, and putting 2-3 or even more in every army will be an auto-win for the campaign
**'''Skyhammer(ROR)''': Drops cluster bombs, so be aware that the damage-area is greater than the marker shows. Basically the Dwarfs answer to big aoe magic to obliterate chaff and elite units alike.
*'''Gyrocopter:''' Your anti-infantry skirmishers, shooting and bombing out those enemy gunners and artillery that thought themselves safe so far in the back. Also good at harassing the harassers that thought they could run a circle around the slowly pivoting Dawi gun lines.
*'''Gyrocopter (Brimstone Gun):''' Switches from general anti-infantry to majority AP damage to harass and focus down targets with more armor. Generally speaking, superior in almost every way to regular Gyrocopters. Fire damage puts a serious dent in units with regeneration (and Wood Elves) and the lower base damage is neglible when you take AP into consideration.

==Tactics==
===Multiplayer Strategies===
Dwarfs are one of the most unique factions in the game battle wise, with an utter lack of mobility and magick, and focusing everything on tanky infantry that can deal decent damage, and powerful guns and artillery. Unfortunately for them, this uniqueness means that unless you're fighting other Dwarfs, you don't have any balanced match ups against other races. Against some you have a clear, obvious advantage and tend to stomp, and against others, they give you swirlies in the bathroom for your lunch money. This is why most competitive players think they're one of the best counterpick factions as you can avoid your bad match ups and play in a favorable situation. Anyway, here's how you can satisfy the grudge against the other races:

*'''Beastmen''': A rush faction, Beastmen will have a hell of a time against you, if you play your cards right. Their complete lack of armor leaves them quite vulnerable to Thunderer fire on the approach and Bolt Throwers can slice through Minotaurs and Cygors with relative ease. Keep a solid screen of staunch Dwarf Warriors between your ranged units and the enemy and bring (Giant) Slayers to turn the Bestigor and Centigor Herds into ground beef.

*'''Bretonnia''': The peasantry of the Bretonnians can safely be ignored (except Foot Squires, after their buffs they can actually fuck you up pretty good), as they'll struggle to do anything to your heavy armor. Instead, you'll want to focus on bringing down their armored cavalry, particularly the Grail Knights and Grail Guardians leading the charges into you. Trollhammer Irondrakes serve fantastically as a powerful Horse-B-Gone tool and your Giant Slayers can chunk through most of their cavalry so long as they're not the ones receiving the initial charge. Bolt Throwers are, again, a powerful tool to use while the Bretonnian cav is on the approach. Just make sure that you keep your flanks thoroughly secure.

*'''[[Total_War_Warhammer/Tactics/Chaos_Dwarfs| Chaos Dwarfs]]''': Here's the thing about the Dawi-Zharr: their Dwarf units are generally better than yours one-on-one but are far more expensive. You can fill the field with heavily armored and relatively cheap infantry while they have to fill it with greenskin slaves.As a result your army as a whole has better staying power than theirs. Your Thunderers in particular are much cheaper than Fireglaives and have better range than Blunderbusses. Chaos Dwarf artillery can pose a big problem as you are pretty stationary and that's what they love but your cannons get a lot more shots per unit than theirs do and if you play your cards right you can win artillery duels. Watch out for Magma Cannons however, as the burning vortex their shots leave behind can really mess up an artillery crew - focus them down first if possible. Chaos Dwarfs also have lots of big monsters and chariots which will be a problem for you just as they always are. Your best bet is to shoot them down ASAP and if all else fails have a few Slayers in reserve. Gryrobombers can do pretty good against clumped Chaos Dwarf elite infantry and have a place in this matchup.

*'''Daemons of Chaos''': Expect Khorne Furies and a mostly Slaanesh-roster. see Slaanesh's guide below on how to deal with this. The good news is that since daemons of Chaos don't have access to greater daemon lords, you 'might' be able to deal with their hero-class lords. But this is mostly a full pain matchup for you, due to the access to the Slaanesh-roster daemons have.

*'''Chaos Warriors''': For Grungni's sake, keep your distance! Chaos Warriors are as tough as you are and hit harder in melee. Stock up on Thunderers and cannons, and bring some great weapon fighters to finish them off. Slayers can help as long as you're careful to make sure the enemy can't hit back. Keep your eyes out for flanking cavalry and chariots, and pray to the gods you can shoot those heathens before they reach your lines!

*'''Dark Elves''': This is a really tricky matchup for you; Dark Elves are fast and bring absurd AP damage in melee and at a range. Your biggest advantage is your superior range and you'll need to lean on it heavily to stand a chance. Grab cannons, Grudge Throwers, Rangers, and Quarrelers and hope to Grungi you can shoot them down before they get close enough to return the favor.

*'''Dwarfs''': Hopefully you have a general idea on the strengths of this faction, you're playing as them! Anti-Armor, full stop. Organ Guns, take the Skolder Guard and bring some Hammerers to crack open your opponent's can.

*'''Empire''': The Empire can be a tricky one because they're almost as good at artillery as you are while also having good cavalry and skirmishers. You'll need to stock up on gyrobombers to disrupt their flanking cavalry and Slayers to take out their knights. Irondrakes can also work well at deleting any aggressive demigryphs or knights. Beyond that, you should double down on your strengths and keep your artillery safe; the human lines will break before yours do.

*'''Greenskins''': As satisfying as it is to bury an axe in a greenskins skull, you are better off dealing with these guys from a distance. Quarrelers and Rangers are your friends here; quantity is as important as quality when fending off a green tide. Organ Guns and Cannons will be better at dealing with monsters than your Slayers, you don't want to send unarmoured units against Arachnarok Spiders or Rogue Idols. Don't forget your Irondrakes and/or your flame cannons, they can melt down anything from goblins to stone trolls. And keep your flanks protected from chariots and pump-wagons, they can wreak havoc on your lines and just ruin your day.

*'''Grand Cathay''': This is another instance of a faction that does what you do, only a hell of a lot worse. Yeah, you won't have to worry too much about these guys when they show up. Your missile boxes beat their missile boxes, their Cav is subpar and will get eaten by Slayers, and the only AP infantry that they have is Anti Large, which you don't have. Box up, get some cannons and Quarrelers, sit back and enjoy some Bugmans as the Cathayans desperately try to figure out how the fuck they're getting into your backline. Yes they do have their own little airforce, but do you really think Umgi inventions can compete with Dawi Gyrocopters? No. If they bring Sky Junks, send some Gyrocopters after them to pick them down. This faction might get more scary as DLC comes out, but for now this should be an easy win as long as you know what you're doing.

*'''High Elves''': Don't let the War of the Beard fool you, this will be one of your hardest match ups. High Elves have a lot of things that threaten you, but the things to fear the most would be their Chariots, Mages, White Lions and <s>Sisters of Averlorn</s> (they do magic damage so their AP isn't as useful as you think). Seriously, any High Elf player who knows what they're doing is going to spam White Lions and it is going to SUCK. Your best bet is to spam either Gyrocopters or Cannons and spread the field. Force the High Elves to have to either attack your artillery emplacements one at a time, allowing your others to fire freely, or use your air power and artillery to spread them apart and pick off pockets. Hammerers also have a niche in this match up, because they beat White Lions pretty hard one-on-one and with support from guns or chaff, they can go toe to toe with Swordmasters (Though don't count on that). Of course, these plans aren't perfect. There's a 99% chance they will bring Alarielle for Tempest and heals to deal with Gyros and they have plenty of mobility to get at your cannons to give the White Lions time to get in. Sadly, this is one of those match ups where even if you bring the most optimized Anti Elgi list possible, there's still a pretty decent chance you'll lose. Avoid this match up if you can.

*'''Khorne''': It's Khorne, c'mon. Warriors of chaos with somehow even less ranged and even killier once they reach your front lines. Bring plenty of armor-piercing infantry and ranged. If you want to live, protect your artillery from Khorne's furies and calvary.

*'''Kislev''': Kislev's big weakness is that their ranged firepower is also their melee power due to hybrid units, and while this seems great at first glance, they sacrifice both elements to have the other. Your artillery and ranged firepower will dump all over Kislev, your biggest concern are War Bears and Sleds, to which you should apply Slayers. Focus down the wizards and you'll out-brutalize Kislev in good time.

*'''Lizardmen''': Lizardmen are a bit of a mixed bag. On one hand, you can scoff at all the Skinks as they ping impotently off of your armor (unless they're the Red-Crested variety). On the other, Saurus are just as stubborn as you are and will take days to chew through without good AP. Bring some Hammerers to eek out an advantage in the inevitable grindfest you'll end up in. Take advantage of the Lizardmen's dearth of ranged firepower and massacre their forces with Irondrakes and Thunderers, while your Dwarf Warriors hold their front line at bay. You have excellent anti-monster units in the form of your Giant Slayers who absolutely will butcher any big dinosaur thrown into your ranks so long as you have some chaff to help trap and soak the damage the beasties can toss about. Though Skinks will largely prove a minor nuisance at best to a majority of your forces, you will ''definitely'' want to screen your (Giant) Slayers from the Skirmishing variety. Key players to watch out for are going to be the Slann Mage-Priests, Skink Priests and Kroxigors. Slann, especially fire/high Slann and Heavens Skink Priests can wreak utter havoc upon your forces with the myriad of vortex spells they can toss out, like candy from a parade float and they should absolutely be prioritized if you find them on the field. (Sacred) Kroxigors, if fielded, are surprisingly vicious anti-infantry monsters and will bowl over a majority of the infantry they're pointed at. Giant Slayers and Trollhammer Irondrakes serve as a solid counter, but you'll still want to swamp the Kroxigors in chaff to mitigate the damage they deal in turn.

*'''Norsca''': This is an easy fight for you. All of that monster hunting anti-large equipment the Norscans bring is going to fly right over your head as you bury your axes in their unarmoured pecs. Bring plenty of Cannons and Bolt Throwers to shoot down enemy Mammoths and bring some Irondrakes to shoot down anything else. Norscans are usually unarmoured, so you can trade your Thunderers for Quarrelers for the better range. Stick to the basics and you'll do fine.

*'''Nurgle''': Holy shit, a faction that might actually be slower than you! And it seems like you will have a hefty advantage as they don't really have a lot of ways to stop your artillery. The biggest thing you will probably have to worry about is their air force, and Furies and Rotflies will be gunning for that back line. Keep some Slayers near your guns, and get ready to surround them if they try to land. After that you just got to deal with Nurgle's rush of Plaguebearers and Nurglings, and I hope you're ready for nothing to ever die ever because that's likely what is gonna happen when Dawi and Nurgle clash. On the ground, Plague Toads and Pox Riders will likely be your biggest threat with their anti-infantry, but they're also big models, so guns and Slayers should do the trick. Expect a Herald as the commander, and if he's dumb enough to bring a Great Unclean One, laugh and shoot it to pieces. With the new debuffs fire damage does to healing, it might also be wise to break out the Irondrakes and Flame Cannons -- you'll have plenty of time to lob napalm at those shambling hordes of Plaguebearers.
** CoC DLC has brought some changes with access to marked WoC units for Nurgle; the units you will definitely see in this match-up now include Nurgle-marked Chaos Knights, Nurgle-marked Chaos Chariots, Nurgle-marked Chaos Warriors/Chosen with Great Weapons and Nurgle Marauder Horsemen with throwing axes. Knights & Chariots are especially a threat, as they will survive long enough from their speed+armour+Nurgle Mark to get behind your lines and wipe artillery or rear-charge your line infantry. Great weapon Warriors/Chosen, while still vulnerable to your guns when getting to your lines, are both units that have respectable chances of beating your units in the grind with their standard WoC stats, but now plus the Nurgle Mark. The Nurgle Warshrine is a strong support piece for the army, but like a GUO its something Dwarfs can delete so easily that you really should not see it. Generally expect Nurgle armies facing you to have a decent share of Nurgle-marked Mortal units from WoC now, unless your opponent hates themselves.

*'''Ogre Kingdoms''': This match is either gonna be your easiest or your hardest, as this comes down to the skill of you, the Ogre player, and what units you brought to the table. The Ogres have massive charge bonuses, but a lot of your units have charge defense, however unlike other factions, the Ogres will only lose half due to their Ogre Charge trait. The biggest threat the Ogres bring to you is their artillery, and if you leave them be they'll reap a devasting toll on your infantry. The good news is, that with the exception of Leadbelchers, all their artillery are a single model. Have your Cannons and Gyrocopters focus them down and you are good to go, or so you would think. Besides the Gnoblars, Ogres are all monster units, which means two things. One is that your artillery and Slayers will have a field day, but two is that their shockingly fast speed means they're gonna out run you and try to outmaneuver you at every opportunity. Your army should be a good balance of Longbeards, or if you are pinching pennies, Dwarf Warriors, they all have charge defense and can help hold the charging balls of lubber back. This is one of the match up where having a ton of Slayers is a good thing, and stack up on them to defend your back lines and cut the Ogres down to size. Your artillery should consist of two, maybe three Cannons to take out artillery and thin their numbers. Irondrakes with Trollhammer Torpedoes won't be a bad call, but they're on the pricey end. Besides some of their units, bring at least two, or simply one unit of Thunderers at most, because a lot of their stuff is unarmored, your main missile troop should be Quarrelers, they're cheap and will have a good time turning Ogres into pin-cushions and are strong enough to fend off Sabertusks. Your artillerys targeting priority should look something like this: artillery units (Ironblasters first, then Leadbelchers), Stonehorns, and finally, everything else. This should be the only match up where you shouldn't bother bringing Miners with Blasting Charges. The only thing they'll have an effect on is Gnoblars and strictly that, which is a waste of cash and will earn you a grudge for being wasteful. Now get out there and strike out some grudges agaisnt the fat bastards!

*'''Skaven''': This is probably the closest we'll get to a 40k-esque matchup (you know, <strike>aside the irony of neither the [[Squats|Dwarfs]] or Skaven being in that setting</strike> [[Leagues of Votann|The Kin has declared a Grudge against the manling who wrote that]]). Between your guns and artillery and their guns and artillery, most of the damage either of you will be dealing to each other will be done from afar. A majority of the Skaven infantry is quite helpless against your frontline infantry, but you'll have a hell of a time pinning anything down with the Skavens quicker movement speeds. Grudge Throwers are going to be king against most Skaven infantry builds, while Bolt Throwers or Cannons should be fielded to snipe any Warp-Lighting Cannons, Plagueclaw Catapults or Hellpit Abominations they have downfield. Warplock Jezzails will be a priority target to focus fire down, as are Warpfire Throwers and Poison Wind Globadiers, should they start getting too close. Aside utilizing their missile units against them, Skaven have absolutely no aerial presence, meaning your Gyrocopters will have virtually free reign to gun down rats at will.

*'''Slaanesh''': A bad day for you all around. It's become apparent, that if you're unlucky enough to run into Slaanesh, you're going to want to forego ranged firepower almost entirely, Miners with Blasting Charges and Ironbreakers will trade efficiently, maybe a safety pick of Thunderers to deal with a Keeper Of Secrets, but AP on everything, Furies, Spawn and chariots will just pulverize your formations in one of the most one-sided setups in the game right now.

*'''Tomb Kings''': The good news is that Tomb Kings don't like fire, and you have fire aplenty. Brimstone Gun-equipped Gyrocoptors are your fastest fire-delivery system, but Irondrakes and Flame Cannons are useful as well. The bad news is, that you don't like chariots, and they have chariots aplenty. Use every trick you can to soften up the chariots before they hit your lines; but it's unlikely you'll be able to stop them all. Grab some Giant Slayers to finish off the ones that survive your barrage and hope it's enough to keep them down. Tomb Kings infantry is no match for you, so you should build your army against their monsters and chariots.

*'''Tzeentch''': Ooh, here is somebody that's going to hate you. Tzeentch units are squishy and their ranged units only have middling range and are better for kiting. He also has no artillery other than Soul Grinders, few big monsters outside of Lords of Change, and relies heavily on spamming spells to activate their army abilities. Bring a Runelord or Thorek on an Anvil of Doom and laugh as their casters explode. Otherwise, pound them into dust with artillery, as they have few answers to an army with better range than them. Just guard the back line against Furies and Doom Knights and don't bother with air units, they'll get shot down in short order.

*'''Vampire Coast''': The most common Vampire Coast strategy is to bunker up with a large number of cheap ranged units and heavy artillery. If that sounds familiar, it's only because it's the same thing you like to do, you're just better at it. Bring plenty of Cannons and some Slayers to deal with the enemy monsters (hint: kill the Necrofex Colossi first). Once the big monsters have been dealt with, the pirates are basically just an inferior version of you, clumps of Quarrelers and Thunderers are plenty to take down the Zombies. And remember not to bunker up too tightly; you may have magic resistance but Winds of Death will still hurt.

*'''Vampire Counts''': Virtually nothing that makes up the rank and file of the Vampire Counts will pose a significant threat to you. Skeletons and Zombies will only serve to slow down your already plodding advance and only deal any meaningful "damage" to you simply by sponging your limited ranged firepower meant for something else. The only standard units that you'll find yourself at a significant disadvantage against will be the Cairn and Hex Wraiths, given your general lack of magical damage. You'll want to engage them with missile attacks for maximum effect and make sure that you are braced for their charges. The main thing you should be focused on taking down will be the Lords and Heroes leading the army; without them, the undead hordes will quickly fall apart (literally). They also pose the single biggest threat to everything you have, as their Lore of Death casters can delete swathes of your army with a single well placed cast if you are positioned carelessly.

*'''Wood Elves''': Wood Elves are an extremely annoying foe who are fundamentally the exact opposite of you. Their infantry can run circles around yours and they can deal frightening amounts of damage against their intended targets, but you'll snap their twiggy spines if you whip 'em with your beards. In general, you're going to be engaged in a very tedious game of "keep away", where the Wood Elves are going to be dancing just outside of your reach while their Glade Guard and Waywatchers pepper you with AP arrows and occasionally test your flanks for weaknesses via Wild Rider/Great Stag Knight cycle charges. Fortunately, you do have a couple tools the elves don't: Artillery. Grudge Throwers excel against WE infantry and can discourage them from trying to camp too far away, while Bolt Throwers and Flame Cannons will make mince-meat of the cavalry/Forest Spirits that may try to break through your lines. Speaking of Forest Spirits, Irondrakes will ''incinerate'' them. Slayers also help against the bigger tree spirits in theory, but the ranged power the Wood Elves bring make them a dicey proposition. As far as their melee infantry options are concerned, the only ones that majorly threaten you are the Bladesingers; their anti-armor magical attacks will scythe through your armor will jaw-dropping speed. Use Thunderers to soften them up on the charge then use Slayers to cut them down swiftly.

===Domination===
General Tier Rank: '''F'''

You are just SO FUCKING SLOW. You opponent is going to get to the point first, no question about it and most armies have plenty of ways to roadblock you in order to stop you from getting on them. While few factions will be able to contest you in a head on charge for the midpoint, once they start going for the side points you will have no way to out contest them. Important to note that there are some maps that you won't get completely dumpstered automatically. The more choke points that are on a map, the better it is for you because then the enemy will be more forced to try to take you head on instead of just avoid direct contact with you in an attempt to cap more points. However, even then there's no way you can outmaneuver your enemy unless they fall asleep at their computer out of boredom. Don't play Dwarfs in Domination until they get some major buffs, a DLC, or rework that will help them move around the map better.

However if you still decide to stay committed to playing dwarfs, the general tip is seize two caps at least and have a squadron of gyrocopters and bombers to harass the foe, ironbreakers are king here, jam them on a point and laugh as your opponent struggles to get them off, rangers and miners are key here as they are the only units with vanguard deployment (this includes the ROR ironbreakers) to delay the foe by brawling with them as your slower units get into position or to reinforce your troops if needed, slayers are necessary here as besides gyrocopters, their the fastest thing you got, bring along 3, 4 if needed, to both delete cav or monsters too big for their britches and do aforementioned delaying tactics, for artillery, on smaller maps, organ guns and flame cannons will be an excellent infantry/cavalry begone tool for clearing out points that are infested with enemy troops, as per the norm, bring a cannon to deal with enemy artillery and snipe monsters regardless of the map size, on longer maps, the grudge-thrower will be a much better alternative for clearing out points, but organ guns and flame cannons are a good deterrent for defending points, as they’ll delete blobs, just make sure there safe from enemy cav and flyers, however the one weakness as listed above, is your slowness, you need to be smart if you want to consistently win domination as dwarfs, assume a box formation as units in said shape, turn about faster and thus let them react to threats flanking around or move to different points faster if it’s necessary (keep in mind, it does not increase movement speed, it just hastens how fast they turn), while it is vulnerable to artillery fire, your cannons should already be firing at said artillery, follow this guide somewhat well and proceed to wipe every smug grin off with an axe, show every YouTuber good or otherwise how wrong they were as you strike out grudges and get vengeance for every domination tier list that put you in F tier!

===Campaign Strategies===
*'''Karaz-A-Karak''': Karaz-A-Karak starts out with a solid base economy and a protected position, with your flanks covered by minor dwarven factions and only one Greenskin faction as your initial enemy. However, that start is deceivingly simple at first; once Grimgor and Queek get going, your position will become increasingly precarious if you're not careful. Your biggest weakness is easily your very slow growth, as the Greenskins and Skaven often will have higher tier units much sooner than you do. Making the jump from Tier 3 to 4 as soon as you can is your top priority. Once your scary lategame units arrive, you can start to dominate the Southlands and expand in any direction you damn please.
**'''Pick Gronbrimdal (Mortal Empires only)''': There is no reason to ever pick Thorgim over Grombrindal as your starting LL. Grombrindal comes with a much better selection of starting units (Gyrocopters, Irondrakes and Thunderers) and his blue skill tree might be one of the most blatantly overpowered things in the game on its own, as Grombrindals variants of the perks not just affect his army, but your entire faction. Thorgrim can be recruited later down the line regardless.
**'''Don't get bogged down''': The initial 50 turns of any campaign might just be called "get ready for Grimgor". While you can expand quickly at the start, it is ill advised (and very tempting) to stray too far from your Capital and end up with your armies battering against your starting enemies while Grimgor happily carves a path straight towards Karaz-A-Karak. Losing Karaz-A-Karak becomes a win condition in this case; if you can successfully defend it, the Greenskins are finished, if you lose it, you can restart a new campaign.

'

*Clan Angrund''' In immortal empires Belegar's difficulty level has been severely reduced, on turn one as soon as you take your first settlement you can full-confederate Karak Izor instantly. After that it's the usual hop and skip to Karak-Eight-Peaks, however with it in Skarsnik's hands now, it's significantly easier to take as Skarsnik doesn't start with a full 20 stack army unlike the 'Crooked Moon Mutineers' from Warhammer 2.
[[Category:Total Warhammer]] {{Total War Warhammer Tactics}}

Total War Warhammer/Tactics/Dwarfs

2023-06-12T16:51:13Z

2A02:1810:4E2C:A900:DC0E:597F:F427:CBEB: /* Legendary Lords and Subfactions */

{{Topquote|Kazukhan-kazakit-ha! (Look out, the Dwarfs are on the warpath!)|Game battle chant for Dwarfs, if you think about it, it should be look <s>down</s> THAT'S A GRUDGE!}}
This is the tactics page for the Total War: Warhammer version of The Dwarfs.

==Why play Dwarfs?==
*Because you want to sit and watch as your enemies are blasted away while coming towards you.
*Cause you're under 5'5 and want '''vengeance''' for all the short jokes.
*You don't want to do too much micro, so an army without much in the way of mobility and cavalry doesn't bother you as much.
*You enjoy having infantry that won't die after being slapped by a wet noodle.
*Slay everything without a beard!!
*FLAMETHROWERS!!!

===Pros===
*'''Durability''': You are a tank faction. Most of your units are categorized with high armour, melee defense and leadership. Even your tier one and chaff are very tanky compared to counterparts from other factions. This is further supplemented by the innate magic resist many of your units have, which ''slightly'' compensates for your otherwise complete lack of magic. Additionally, with their naturally high leadership, dwarfs do not usually break unless hopelessly outnumbered or if you screw up massively by getting cavalry charged in the rear. Frankly, your units will hold out forever.
**Your magic resistance got nerfed in the third game to ''only'' resist magical spells. Still useful, but now units with magic attacks, I.E Daemons, are going to be way better at cracking you open.
*'''Range''': Guns, guns and more guns! Dwarfs have some of the best blackpowder units in the entire game. Thunderers and Cannons can lay a whooping on anything they are firing on, and their artillery isn't anything to sneer at. Even their non-AP range units are very good for their price, and it's not hard for them to earn their points back as long as they are defended.
*'''If they get close, Nut 'em!''': As if being being one of the best factions at shooting was not enough, their missile units can also hold their own in close quarters better than most.
*'''Airforce''': Gyrocopters with their anti large can get you control over the air, and their ability to kite monsters into oblivion is a good skill to have. Even Gyrobombers have a niche for their blob killing capabilities after recent buffs.
*'''Runes''': Where other races rely on the fickle Winds of Magic, you have your reliable runes. Runes supply surprisingly good buffs and debuffs that can help your army out, making them a great way to make sure your infantry stays in the fight a bit longer. The fact that they aren't limited by a power reserve also means that they'll remain a viable option well into the latter stages of a fight, where other factions might begin to tap out of their mystical power.
*'''Anti-large''': You laugh when the enemy brings big monsters. With all your AP missiles, Anti Large artillery and slayers, you have the one of the easiest times killing monsters out of any faction in the game.
*'''Strong Economy''': It's campaign specific but yeah, it turns out the species who's renowned for being the best at making shit is also one of the best at making money. The resource building chains go up to level IV instead of stopping at level III, you can mass produce Dwarf Beer anywhere. Putting together Doomstacks of Top Tier Dawi troops is easier.
*'''Good for Beginners''': Everyone was just starting once, if you are new to Warhammer Total War or just Total War in general the Dawi are (ironically enough) forgiving. Something like the Wood Elves is fragile and has a limited margin for error, Dwarfs on the other hand have more of a fudge factor in most match ups. Not to say that it's easy mode playing dwarfs, but the likelihood of things going pear shaped in a second is lower.

===Cons===
*'''Lack of Mobility''': With no Cav, monsters and slow infantry, Dwarfs are the least mobile faction in the game. You will spend the majority of the game standing still.
*'''Lack of Magic''': Though your most recent rework makes your runes a damn good alternative, you don't really have magic. This can pose a problem when you face similarly physically durable armies in battle and lack a reliable, magical alternative for damage. Additionally, though you defensively have a 25% resistance to the arcane, many large vortex spells will still sting quite a bit and your complete lack of magical healing means it'll be hard to bounce back from the damage you do take.
*'''Chariots''': Chariots are the bane of a Dwarf players existence. They don't have any real way to lock them down and, as you'd expect, AP anti infantry can really kill what the Dwarfs want to do on the battlefield. Due to the rework to how bracing and knock down works, this isn’t as bad as before, but chariots can still be a problem
*'''Predictability''': Most veteran players know what's going to happen when Dwarfs are picked. They are going to go for a cheap, numerous and sturdy front line and a lot of guns and artillery. This means that Dwarfs are easy to plan for as they only have one real viable tactic. Building an army around fighting Dwarfs is something players from all races know how to do.
*'''Lack of Good Lord Options''': Do you like the Runelord or Thorek? No? Well you better start because in multiplayer they're your only viable options. Grombrindal is an ok duelist but honestly Dwarf lords in general kind of suck. With no mounts and no way to stick to their targets it's hard for them to get anything done. This problem got better with the Twisted and the Twilight due to the changes to knockdown effects, but sticking to targets will still be hard
*'''Hard campaign''': With all the changes to the factions around them, the Dawi have fallen on some pretty hard times. The lifetime of WH2 dotted the landscape around Karaz-A-Karak alone with a huge number of guaranteed enemies that you will have to look out for, with your most reliable allies in the Empire being very far away. The other subfactions don't fare much better and your slow growth seriously hurts your ability to expand, especially when compared with your most dominant enemies, the Greenskins of the Badlands and Clan Mors further down the road.
*'''Bad in Domination''': Turns out your stubby little legs makes it really hard for you to capture objectives. Due to your lack of mobility you can't effectively capture points since other factions can just out race you to them and get more units on them. As such, you're widely considered the weakest faction in Domination.
*'''DLC''': A con for everyone, but fortunately you get off easier than many others. Unfortunately, a couple of your best units, namely Runelords and Rangers, are in fact locked behind DLC and if you want to really use your Dwarfs to the fullest, you'll need to pay the toll.

==Universal Traits==

*'''The Great Book of Grudges''': The fact that the sacred Dammaz Kron went unmentioned on this pages for so long merits an entry on its own. The Book of Grudges documents every slight committed against your faction, including legendary grudges that you start out with. Whenever something bad happens, i.e. you lose a settlement, get raided or a hostile faction repeatedly trespasses on your turf without you allowing it, it merits an entry in the book. These entries can (and will) accumulate over time, and depending on how much your Dorfs disliked the transgression, will vary in severity, which fills up a meter that gives you some penalties and some bonusses. High severity from unresolved Grudges gives you minor public order and research speed penalties, but it also gives all of your armies a charge bonus (since the Dwarfs are so pissed off) and increases the chance of Slayers and Giant Slayers popping up in your Regiments of Renown pool, where they can then be recruited instantly into your armies. Resolving Grudges and Legendary Grudges (such as retaking Karak Eight Peaks as Belegar Ironhammer) also earns you powerful bonusses (money, Oathgold, small buffs for the entire faction ) and special Runes.
*'''Oathgold''': The secondary resource of the Dwarfs. Practically identical to the Mortuary Cult of the Tomb Kings, with the key difference being that the Dwarfs can make much more stuff with Oathgold and that the stuff is much more abundant. Oathgold is earned through resolving Grudges, doing missions and quests, Gold Mines and some special buildings such as the Brightstone Mine in Mount Gunbad. Oathgold, combined with trade goods, can be used to create items for your Lords and Heroes, which makes it downright trivial to kit out every single character on the map with some special gizmos to make them really powerful. Oathgold can also be used to make Character and Banner Runes, the former can be applied as equipment to individual characters (with up to 3 individual runes at maximum), the latter functions like Banners that you can give units to give them special bonusses and abilities.
*'''Expert Charge Defense''': Barring Slayers, every single one of your units has Expert Charge Defense, which nullifies charge bonusses and also the momentum of units charging into your staunch line of angry Dwarfs.
*'''Magic Resistance''': Every Dwarf has a built in 25% Magic Resist (Spell Resist in WH3). Consult the main page for WHFB Dwarfs as to why.

==Legendary Lords and Subfactions==
*'''Thorgrim Grudgebearer:''' The high king himself, and the only large non-war machine unit in your roster, as he is carried on a massive throne sled by some burly dwarfs, Thorgrim isn't huge on offence, better than say mid-tier combat lords, but he's mostly just a hard to kill brick of leadership. Dwarfs in range of him just become slightly harder to break, which isn't saying much given their default morale, and he's not easily sniped. This results in him being kind of underwhelming, you know he's not going to die like a bitch, but you also know that he's not exactly going to recoup even a quarter of his cost. Is kind of safe in campaign play for beginners, but Grombrindal is overall superior. - Pass.
*'''Ungrim Ironfist:''' The Slayer King, bane of anything taller than six feet, Ungrim is the opposite of Thorgrim; all offence, with low defence. Ungrim is actually pretty good in terms of being a hero-killer and monster-hunter, he's not going to solo Tyrion or Kroq-Gar, and don't even think of monster lords like Kholek or monstrous mounts such as a Tomb King on a War Sphinx, without a unit to bog them down. The problem with Ungrim is that while he can throw hands and live up to his title, he eats a lot of damage for a Dwarf, or just in general for a combat Lord, he's easy to snipe with massed missiles if caught in the open, and while he can butcher most things sent his way, he'll only be able to do this once or twice in a battle before he's at serious risk of dying. Don't let that 120 armour & Unbreakable make you think he's a tank, Ungrim's Melee Defence is quite low for a combat lord, and that low dwarf speed means he can by kited to death. Thorgrim lacks the damage to recoup his cost, Ungrim lacks the defence to recoup his costs. If playing with an ally that has access to Lore of Life he can be kept alive, but you're asking a lot of resources to support the Slayer King. - Pass.
*'''Grombrindal:''' THE WHITE DWARF, Grombrindal doesn't bring anything really special to the table, he's a decent duelist, although lacking the balls-to-the-wall offence of Ungrim Ironfist, Grombrindal is nowhere near as risky for a combat Lord. The flashbomb ability can lockdown mobile Heroes and give the White Dwarf a few easy hits. Doesn't quite bring much for the rest of the army, but is the best Legendary Lord for cost-benefit tradeoffs. He can fight, he can survive, and he can make the entire army Unbreakable with a reusable map-wide buff. - Niche but competitive in that niche. In Campaign, he is easily the best LL the Dwarfs offer. His blue skill tree affects ''your entire faction'' and the four blessings you can choose every 20 turns (10 after picking a specific skill) are all very powerful, a whopping +25% Research Rate is no joke, as are +10 Melee Attack and Defense for every unit in Grombrindals army.
*'''Belegar Ironhammer:'''(DLC) Belegar is really just a wall, he's harder to kill than Thorgrim as they have comparable stats, but he has a silver shield for 55% missile resistance. That's all. Just an insanely hard to kill Lord, sure his offence isn't terrible, being better than Thorgrim's on base stats and a nice buff can be popped to go higher. But honestly you're paying a lot for a Lord that won't die, and generally speaking Dwarfs in Total War: Warhammer aren't a faction that is centred around their generals or Heroes. No real wizards to throw high-impact spell effects, no mobile Heroes that can exploit small gaps to flank units or hunt down supporting pieces like buffers, wizards or artillery crews. The only upshot to taking Belegar's subfaction in multiplayer is getting access the Ancestor Heroes who are damned hard to kill, but are also the only Dwarf units that are scared of magic damage, which can sort of be a mind-games thing because the default assumption to seeing Clan Angrund picked is that Ancestor Heroes are on the field, so grab some magic damage to delete them, but then seeing that there are no ghost Dwarfs means that the magic damage is actually a big waste considering all Dwarfs have 25% Magic Resistance. - Pass.
*'''Thorek Ironbrow:'''(FLC): With the rework comes a new LL and Thorek serves this role, being the latest (and most likely last) new contender in the Lustrian Thunderdome in the Vortex Campaign, and starting at the southernmost tip of the map in Karak Zorn on Mortal Empires. He serves as a supercharged Runelord with access to a unique mount that messes quite a bit with enemy spellcasting and improved Runic Magic on his own part. In the campaign, his legendary conservativeness translates into bonusses for "traditional" Dwarfen ranged units like Quarrelers and Grudge Throwers. Not to worry though, since he starts with a Rune of Burning that makes the Catapult projectiles [[Awesome|FUCKING EXPLODE]] and dramatically increases the combat value of Quarrelers in his own Army quite significantly (arguably making them even better than Thunderers). His campaign goal revolves around finding several lost Dwarfen artifacts, which can then be used to craft powerful buffs for your whole faction. [[Derp|He also can make enemy casters explode.]] - Best Multiplayer Lord pick.

==Units==
===Generic Lords===
*'''Dwarf Lord:''' No, just no, he suffers from the same issue that the Legendary Lords suffer from, being too slow. But wait there's more, the generic Lord is easier to kill in combat, provides less army support, and does less damage. He's not even the cheapest option to help save costs. I mean he has a shield, but its only bronze. Unless you've got some kind of bet riding on a battle and there's a specific stipulation that you cannot use any other Lord, screw the money because he's too crap. That said compared to generic foot Lords in other factions he's quite difficult to kill, which is more advice for fighting Dwarf Lords in campaign really. PASS!
*'''Runelord:''' (DLC) Yes, yes yes. The one competitive General in multiplayer, the Runelord is just a walking bubble of passive buffs that make your low tier units good, and your good infantry units even better. Has good active abilities, like Master Rune of Oath & Steel which gives +30 armour to all dwarfs in range, or the Rune of Speed which adds 45% speed and 24 melee attack to all dwarfs in range. This is the Lord pick that supports the dwarf army, and don't think he's some kind of wizard that dies when someone looks at him funny, while the melee defence is low at 40, the Runelord has the same 120 armour as the other Lords, plus up to 35% missile resistance, sharing 20% of that with nearby allies. Slapping him on an Anvil of Doom gives a special ability that causes enemy casters to automatically miscast for minor damage when near him. TL;DR fucks magic, gets buffs. - Good if you want Thorek but a bit cheaper.

===Legendary Heroes (Clan Angrund Only)===
All [[Clan Angrund]] has such a strong relationship with their ancestors, they come back as ghosts. Like all ghosts, they have a 75% physical resistance instead of magic resistance, with magic attacks, Unbreakable, but no armor and less health than normal. They have Fear and Terror making them good at chasing the enemy off. They themselves are weak to magic attacks, but who takes that much offense magic against Dwarfs anyway?

*'''King Lunn Ironhammer:''' is one of the two ghost Thanes, being the offensive one, with slightly more Melee attack than a normal Thane.
*'''Halkenhaf Stonebeard:''' the other ghost Thane, being the most defensive of the par with significantly lower melee attack but a very high defense of 65 and silver shield, letting him minge with enemies for a protracted time to proc terror routs.
*'''Throni Ironbrow:''' Most likely to take as he is a Runesmith, so someone that needs protection while also being in the front lines.
*'''Dramar Hammerfist:''' the ghost engineer so paying extra for a harder to kill gun lines buffer and better at chasing away those that try to disrupt them.

===Heroes===
*'''Master Engineer:''' Basically a must if you're running more than 2 artillery pieces, buffs artillery, has a decent sniper rifle of his own, not great in a fight with anything beyond hound packs and light cavalry, so don't expect him to be an effective guard for the cannons he's buffing. However if there is another unit nearby casting Entrenchment right before they rout will make the unit hold the line and fight even after being routed. On campaign they also boost your army's mobility. Aaaaaand the Dwarf Rework happened, buffing him even further with the ability of the Vampirate Gunnery Wight to restore lost ammo to artillery pieces for up to five times. Just too good to miss out on if you're bringing a bunch of cannons (and who doesn't, honestly).
*'''Runesmith:''' Basically a squishier version of the Runelord, has many of the same buffs, both passive and active. With the Dwarf rework, these guys have gone from being merely decent to amazing. While utilizing a rune puts every other rune on a shared cooldown, this only applies per caster; having multiple Runesmiths allows you to stack multiple buffs simultaneously or across multiple units without having to wait out the full 60 second global cooldown. They might not necessarily be an auto-include persay, but having one or two of these guys in your army is strongly recommended.
*'''Thane:''' While they still suffer from being slow, Thanes can be used more aggressively than Legendary Lords. Kit them out with the Rune of Slowness to gimp enemy mobility, or give them the Ironbeard's Ring and coordinate with a source of fire damage: Flame Cannons, Dragonback Slayers, Warriors of Dragonfire Pass, basic Irondrakes, or Brimstone Gyrocopters, all of these will deal serious damage to units inside the debuff aura.

===Infantry===
*'''Miners''': The closest thing to cannon fodder in the Dwarf Roster, miners are cheap AP units. Also give "speed" and breadth to Dawi list by vanguarding.
*'''Dwarf Warriors''': Did you know that a unit of Dwarf Warriors costs 475 gold but can hold against 3 units of Empire Swordsmen, costing 400 gold each, for just over 2 minutes and racking up roughly 90-100 kills before dying/breaking? Dwarf Warriors aren't great, just good, and are very much just a shield wall frontline. Dwarf Warriors are very cost-effective starting units. They will trade positively against most infantry that are tier 1-3 excluding units with high AP values or anti-infantry buffs. Dwarf Warriors aren't the same as elite heavy infantry however, they will break in time, if rear charged, if attacked by great weapon units, if hit with leadership debuffs, or if attacked by characters. This is a unit that buys time for a unit in the second line to get in position to assist, do not assume you can just deploy them as a single line and have artillery sit safely behind them.
**'''Warriors of Dragonfire Pass'''(ROR): Slightly better warriors that deal fire damage in combat, not a guaranteed pick most of the time, but good against any faction that is vulnerable to fire, consider pairing with a Thane carrying Ironbeard's Ring to boost damage.
*'''Dwarf Warriors (Great Weapons)''': You know how Dwarf Warriors can hold frontlines for a time but need a second line unit to assist them, this is cheapest of the second line units. Regular warriors have shields, 40 Melee Defence, and charge defence against large units, Warriors with Great Weapons don't have those defences, they get armour piercing damage which is the kind of offence needed to make up for the vanilla warriors' shortcomings. Don't try and use them as a frontline unit, and replace them when you can with other melee infantry.
*'''Longbeards''': Warriors +1 really, they buff the leadership of other units (it's the generic Encourage passive so no stacking with Lords), so consider mixing them with warriors. Cost-wise your mostly paying for better Melee Defence, better Leadership, the leadership aura, and Immune to Psychology compared to vanilla Warriors. A common question is which is better for cost, Longbeards or Warriors, but outside of fighting undead armies that have tons of fear/terror effects, the answer to the question is; use both. While the differences between the two units are obvious in comparison, to the player on the other side of the battlefield it doesn't matter much because a Dwarf line is still a solid formation that is hard to break. Longbeards work good in the wings to buff leadership in the flanks, and having warrior units means you can save gold for more missile units and artillery.
*'''Longbeards (Great Weapons)''': While the difference between shield Warriors and shield Longbeards isn't much, the great weapon variant favours the Longbeards, which come with Charge Defense and Armor-Piercing (but no target specialization). In MP, where every gold coin counts, if all you need is cheap AP, take the Warriors, but if you want something tankier and able to encourage your dwarfs to hold out a bit longer, take these guys.
**'''The Grumbling Guard'''(ROR): Not too bad, stat wise its a bit more armour & melee attack, 10 more leadership, and 13 more Melee Defence, which puts them at a whopping 51 Melee Defence. You don't get any improved damage output with these guys, instead you get an ability that replenishes 9% of vigour for them and nearby allies. This may not sound like much, but fatigue debuffs are crippling for units, and Dwarfs rely on grinding things out so even a small vigour buff to some units is good even if it just moves them from exhausted to very tired. But wait, this ability has infinite uses and a low cooldown so spam it away. While Hammerers do the same job but better, the Grumbling Guard are fantastic for keeping Ironbreakers in better condition than their enemies.
*'''Slayers''': Slayers are kind of weird. They're unbreakable, quick (for a Dwarf), hit hard, and do a lot of damage with no consideration to survivability. This means that they can seriously fuck up higher-tier units but on the same time are vulnerable to cannon fodder. It does not matter if you're a crappy goblin with a crappy spear, it's getting through a Slayer's hide as much as a Chosen's Daemonforged Axe. When using Slayers, hold them back so that other units, especially ones with charge defense, take the brunt of the charge before moving the slayers to counter-attack, and while it might cost you the charge bonus, having them attack through the buffer unit really improves the lifespan of your slayers (Probably much to their chagrin). Note that if you ever leave them in the open, missile units just have to imagine shooting them to wipe the unit, which is an expensive mistake. Also a definite must take against vampire counts and Tomb Kings with all their fear effects but do not ever think about using them against Vampire Pirates because they will get shot to pieces before any fear/terror units get close for the unbreakable to matter. Also, leave them at home against Wood Elves, or if you have fore-knowledge that your opponent likes horse-archer tactics.
*With the Dwarf rework that dropped together with Thorek Ironbrow, they went from terrible in Single Player to a pretty good choice for the early game, since you can now recruit them anywhere as long as your grudge meter is up. It also makes unlimited Slayer Doomstacks lead by Ungrim Ironfist a terrifying sight to behold.
**'''Dragonback Slayers'''(ROR): Slayers with better MA & MD, and they get physical resistance on top of the shield defense. The real value comes with their passive that activates in melee, it gives them fire damage, fire resistance, and applies slow debuff and the flammable trait for weakness to fire (doesn't stack if the enemy already has the flammable trait, but will stack with other effects of a different name that reduce fire resistance). The physical resist, slow debuff and the combo of fire damage and flammable debuff makes this unit a generally better pick over vanilla slayers, note that they do not get the fire resistance outside of combat so getting hit by flaming missiles outside of combat will hurt, the lore of fire spells are still subject to dwarf magic resistance though.
*'''Giant Slayers''': These are just super slayers, too costly to run a lot of. They will instantly blend light cavalry units like Marauder Horsemen or Ellyrian Reavers that dare to charge them, not that you should be using them to counter these units, it's just funny to see happen. Giant Slayers are basically Ungrim Ironfist as many Dwarfs instead of one. What they don't kill will be pretty close to death. Cannon fodder might counter slayers, but Giant Slayers dish out enough melee damage that you only need to worry about elite infantry and high mass units charging them. More vulnerable to shooting as they don't get the missile defense that Slayers get, these guys are expensive but do the job. Not recommended as a staple unit in army builds due to their cost, but good to pick if you're against monster or cavalry heavy armies.
*'''Hammerers''': Your well-armored, AP Damage dealing elite Dwarfs, not the same tank as a Longbeard but will deal serious AP damage. They've been reworked in the latest game, giving them substantially more health and magical(!) damage, meaning they're your best chance against Daemons and Treekin. **Still the same weaknesses as before, though: they're a Hammer (heh) in an Army of Anvils, so they'll mostly be pushing their way through your infantry
**Peak Gate Guard(ROR): The ultimate anti-armor unit, they go through heavily armored units like swordsmen through skavenslaves and then let other Dawi also participate in the fun.

===Ranged Infantry===
*'''Thunderers''': Like Empire handgunners, but you don't need to babysit them as much. A very useful unit even in the lategame that won't break the bank.
*'''Irondrakes:''' Where the fun begins. Ridiculously high damage output, solidly armoured. Need positioning to work right, but will absolutely demolish anything that you point them at. Their flamethrowers are considered artillery so they cannot be blocked by shields and inflict morale penalty upon anything they hit. They are surprisingly strong in melee against infantry if not deployed in a thin line because the back row can use their flamethrowers at point-blank, but not against cavalry as they'll pierce till the back row.
**'''The Skolder Guard'''(ROR): Replaces Lava for Steam to be an anti-armor unit. Much tougher than an Irondrakes with Physical resistance which is nice to have when the enemy gets a sneaky charge. They will multch full-plate units quickly given they have an even faster reload speed but watch out as you will also burn through their limited ammunition just as quickly. Against enemies with less armor you're better off using regular Irondrakes.
*'''Irondrakes (Trollhammer Torpedo)''': the Anti large version of the Irondrakes, having rocket launchers instead of Flamers. Often times Irondrakes can just melt through the armor of most things they are pointed at, sometimes they are Cavalry or monsters that have enough armor to shrug off that current of magma. Unlike regular Irondrakes they can shoot over units and obstacles. Don't be fooled by how their torpedoes explode, they don't do splash damage and should only attack infantry if you don't have anything bigger to shoot.

===Combined Infantry===
*'''Quarrellers''': Boring but practical. Like dwarf warriors, they're able to trade shots with the tier 1 ranged units of pretty much every other faction and winning because they come with shields on top of their dwarf armor. They also come with armor piercing, which makes them a budget option for shooting stuff like chaos warriors. However, they do less DPS per gold spent than similar units like empire crossbowmen and darkshards.
**As mentioned above, Thorek brings out the best in these guys, keeping them very relevant even to the late game. The shield variant is best used against missile-heavy factions like Wood Elves, but does nothing against Artillery.
*'''Quarrellers (Great Weapons)''': Similar to Quarrelers, except they give up shields in exchange for armor-piercing melee weapons. Won't win much in close combat, but they'll take down more enemies before they're overwhelmed, particularly against squishy units like harpies.
**Thorek buffs them to an insane degree to the point that when combined with all the relevant campaign bonuses, Quarrelers will become the core of your army. They're still not a frontline since they only have so many models in a unit, but 6-10 of these guys can outright delete anything that gives your Longbeards and Ironbreakers a hard time (Mammoths, stonehorns, even Rogue Idols). They also autoresolve very well, taking more losses than the shielded variant, but will take less losses than your frontline infantry.
*'''Miners (Blasting Charges)''': take that Cheap miner, then give them a single volley for bomb-throwing. Each model only gets one bomb, so make it count. Turn off ''Fire at Will'' and select the targets manually. A well-thrown Blasting Charge will decimate most charging infantry.
**'''Ekrund Miners'''(ROR): A regiment that Gets 3 Blasting Charges instead of 1. Depending on how well you managed them, that's paying less gold then recruiting 3 Blasting Charge Miners which matter very much in the gold restricted multiplayer.
*'''Ironbreakers''': The fact that Ironbreakers are one of the toughest units in the game would make them a key part of a Dawi late game army. Add to that blasting charges and you have something which can stomp most other infantry into the ground, blowing away a quarter of their hitpoints and ruining their charge before finishing off the survivors. Their only downside is that their damage in hand to hand is not that great, but that's what thunderers, slayers and artillery is for. NEVER let artillery, including artillery towers, target them. They're so slow they're target practice and they're no.1 priority as dwarfs don't have anything bigger.
**'''Norgrimlings Ironbreakers''':(ROR) Even better Ironbreakers, With bigger model size (so more bombes and unit health), a faster throwing arm, Vanguard, and Immune to Psychology. Overall a more powerful unit that can holds back the hords for longer while dealing more casualties.
*'''Rangers''': Sneaky Dwarf Quarrellers getting Vanguard and Stalk for a surprise Dwarf ambush. They have better speed to help with positioning and catching enemies at least when compared to other Dawi. They're armour is pretty good for most armies, but among Dwarfs they're on the lower end of defenses.
*'''Rangers (Great Weapons)''': Ranger equivalent of Quarrellers(Great Weapons) with one key difference; unlike the great weapon Quarreler the Rangers give up their crossbows entirely in favor of shorter ranged, higher AP throwing axes. Surprise AP flanking is a thing any Dwarf list could ask for. Keep in mind that each dwarf only carries 8 axes, so they'll run out much quicker than other rangers. Once they run out of throwing axes they become a decent anti-armour skirmishing unit, although their low defense means they need to chose their opponents carefully.
**'''Ulthar's Raiders'''(ROR) a unit your should be more careful with than just normal Rangers with Great Weapons, as they get the [[Witch Hunter]]'s ability to Mark a unit for death. You do get a fair amount of range despite having only infantry speed, being able to strip an enemy of a lot of their protection they had against ranged weapons. Good take if your using a Focus fire strategy, assuming your can keep the Raiders safe while making back their cost.
*'''Bugman's Rangers''' Surprisingly not a ROR. Improved Rangers, having the regenerative and drunkenness properties of Bugman's liquid courage. they are better at fighting off harassers while their improved shooting and HP recovery help them win archer fights. These are to Rangers as Longbeards are to Warriors: a straight upgrade assuming you can afford it. In MP, they can last longer without support and work best if you're good at micro. If not, you're probably better just leaving them at home in favor of more units of regular rangers.

===Cavalry===
Does not exist. See Slayers, Rangers and Air Units if you want something fast, you beardling.

===Artillery===
*'''Bolt Thrower:''' Your cheaper anti-large Artillery. More accurate and shoots faster than a cannon, but outclassed by them in splash and penetration power. Best used to take out elite cavalry and monsters in the early campaign.
*'''Grudge Thrower''': Your first artillery unit. Fills a role like an Empire Mortar as a long-range anti-infantry weapon giving it has the largest radius of splash damage on impact.
**'''Gob-Lobber (Grudge Thrower)(ROR)''': Like the Grudge Thrower, but better. Also has live Goblins bolted to the projectiles. Causes morale penalties to targets, which stacks with the penalty for being hit by artillery.
*'''Cannon:''' Your classic artillery. Slow to fire but harder to dodge, best used as an Anti-large weapon while also killing models in high armor units, through can have difficulties hitting if the enemy zigzags too much like most Artillery units.
*'''Organ Gun:''' An effective horse begone tool, with good armor piercing and a ton of cannon balls flying everywhere, cavalry will quickly and efficiently die off in droves as your foe rages, if there’s no cav to shoot, then this thing is good for pulping infantry and can do a decent job at eliminating chariots.
*'''Flame Cannon''' Jack-of-all-trades artillery. Great area damage to deal with blobs of infantry and while it doesn't cause AP damage, its base damage is high enough that it doesn't matter. Funny enough, its stats make it much better at breaking towers and walls than cannons.

===Air Units===
The closest thing to "cavalry". Flying Bombers. Fill a role as the fast-moving guns to shoot at enemy flanks and drop anti-infantry bombs. The rotor blades can also dish out a good amount of melee damage, but having almost no melee defense makes them relatively fragile despite having high armor. They are often safe in the air, but keep them away from other flyers and AP missiles. Despite this, they are absurdly fast having speed in the 200s to run from most problems (only Pegasus Knights or Hawk Riders could catch them without nets or debuffs). To use effectively will require some mico.

*'''Gyrobomber:''' Your dedicated bomber which sacrifices other aspects to be the best at that. As a single mobile unit dedicated to hovering over infantry to drop annihilating bombs multiple times during a game, they obviously require the most micromanagement. A well placed carpet bombing can absolutely devastate the enemy frontline, and its machine gun can put out Ratling-Gun levels of DPS on a much more mobile platform.
Important to note that on small unit scale, the gyrobombers bombs are not reduced in damage, so one gyrobomber becomes an army-shredding machine on that unit scale, and putting 2-3 or even more in every army will be an auto-win for the campaign
**'''Skyhammer(ROR)''': Drops cluster bombs, so be aware that the damage-area is greater than the marker shows. Basically the Dwarfs answer to big aoe magic to obliterate chaff and elite units alike.
*'''Gyrocopter:''' Your anti-infantry skirmishers, shooting and bombing out those enemy gunners and artillery that thought themselves safe so far in the back. Also good at harassing the harassers that thought they could run a circle around the slowly pivoting Dawi gun lines.
*'''Gyrocopter (Brimstone Gun):''' Switches from general anti-infantry to majority AP damage to harass and focus down targets with more armor. Generally speaking, superior in almost every way to regular Gyrocopters. Fire damage puts a serious dent in units with regeneration (and Wood Elves) and the lower base damage is neglible when you take AP into consideration.

==Tactics==
===Multiplayer Strategies===
Dwarfs are one of the most unique factions in the game battle wise, with an utter lack of mobility and magick, and focusing everything on tanky infantry that can deal decent damage, and powerful guns and artillery. Unfortunately for them, this uniqueness means that unless you're fighting other Dwarfs, you don't have any balanced match ups against other races. Against some you have a clear, obvious advantage and tend to stomp, and against others, they give you swirlies in the bathroom for your lunch money. This is why most competitive players think they're one of the best counterpick factions as you can avoid your bad match ups and play in a favorable situation. Anyway, here's how you can satisfy the grudge against the other races:

*'''Beastmen''': A rush faction, Beastmen will have a hell of a time against you, if you play your cards right. Their complete lack of armor leaves them quite vulnerable to Thunderer fire on the approach and Bolt Throwers can slice through Minotaurs and Cygors with relative ease. Keep a solid screen of staunch Dwarf Warriors between your ranged units and the enemy and bring (Giant) Slayers to turn the Bestigor and Centigor Herds into ground beef.

*'''Bretonnia''': The peasantry of the Bretonnians can safely be ignored (except Foot Squires, after their buffs they can actually fuck you up pretty good), as they'll struggle to do anything to your heavy armor. Instead, you'll want to focus on bringing down their armored cavalry, particularly the Grail Knights and Grail Guardians leading the charges into you. Trollhammer Irondrakes serve fantastically as a powerful Horse-B-Gone tool and your Giant Slayers can chunk through most of their cavalry so long as they're not the ones receiving the initial charge. Bolt Throwers are, again, a powerful tool to use while the Bretonnian cav is on the approach. Just make sure that you keep your flanks thoroughly secure.

*'''[[Total_War_Warhammer/Tactics/Chaos_Dwarfs| Chaos Dwarfs]]''': Here's the thing about the Dawi-Zharr: their Dwarf units are generally better than yours one-on-one but are far more expensive. You can fill the field with heavily armored and relatively cheap infantry while they have to fill it with greenskin slaves.As a result your army as a whole has better staying power than theirs. Your Thunderers in particular are much cheaper than Fireglaives and have better range than Blunderbusses. Chaos Dwarf artillery can pose a big problem as you are pretty stationary and that's what they love but your cannons get a lot more shots per unit than theirs do and if you play your cards right you can win artillery duels. Watch out for Magma Cannons however, as the burning vortex their shots leave behind can really mess up an artillery crew - focus them down first if possible. Chaos Dwarfs also have lots of big monsters and chariots which will be a problem for you just as they always are. Your best bet is to shoot them down ASAP and if all else fails have a few Slayers in reserve. Gryrobombers can do pretty good against clumped Chaos Dwarf elite infantry and have a place in this matchup.

*'''Daemons of Chaos''': Expect Khorne Furies and a mostly Slaanesh-roster. see Slaanesh's guide below on how to deal with this. The good news is that since daemons of Chaos don't have access to greater daemon lords, you 'might' be able to deal with their hero-class lords. But this is mostly a full pain matchup for you, due to the access to the Slaanesh-roster daemons have.

*'''Chaos Warriors''': For Grungni's sake, keep your distance! Chaos Warriors are as tough as you are and hit harder in melee. Stock up on Thunderers and cannons, and bring some great weapon fighters to finish them off. Slayers can help as long as you're careful to make sure the enemy can't hit back. Keep your eyes out for flanking cavalry and chariots, and pray to the gods you can shoot those heathens before they reach your lines!

*'''Dark Elves''': This is a really tricky matchup for you; Dark Elves are fast and bring absurd AP damage in melee and at a range. Your biggest advantage is your superior range and you'll need to lean on it heavily to stand a chance. Grab cannons, Grudge Throwers, Rangers, and Quarrelers and hope to Grungi you can shoot them down before they get close enough to return the favor.

*'''Dwarfs''': Hopefully you have a general idea on the strengths of this faction, you're playing as them! Anti-Armor, full stop. Organ Guns, take the Skolder Guard and bring some Hammerers to crack open your opponent's can.

*'''Empire''': The Empire can be a tricky one because they're almost as good at artillery as you are while also having good cavalry and skirmishers. You'll need to stock up on gyrobombers to disrupt their flanking cavalry and Slayers to take out their knights. Irondrakes can also work well at deleting any aggressive demigryphs or knights. Beyond that, you should double down on your strengths and keep your artillery safe; the human lines will break before yours do.

*'''Greenskins''': As satisfying as it is to bury an axe in a greenskins skull, you are better off dealing with these guys from a distance. Quarrelers and Rangers are your friends here; quantity is as important as quality when fending off a green tide. Organ Guns and Cannons will be better at dealing with monsters than your Slayers, you don't want to send unarmoured units against Arachnarok Spiders or Rogue Idols. Don't forget your Irondrakes and/or your flame cannons, they can melt down anything from goblins to stone trolls. And keep your flanks protected from chariots and pump-wagons, they can wreak havoc on your lines and just ruin your day.

*'''Grand Cathay''': This is another instance of a faction that does what you do, only a hell of a lot worse. Yeah, you won't have to worry too much about these guys when they show up. Your missile boxes beat their missile boxes, their Cav is subpar and will get eaten by Slayers, and the only AP infantry that they have is Anti Large, which you don't have. Box up, get some cannons and Quarrelers, sit back and enjoy some Bugmans as the Cathayans desperately try to figure out how the fuck they're getting into your backline. Yes they do have their own little airforce, but do you really think Umgi inventions can compete with Dawi Gyrocopters? No. If they bring Sky Junks, send some Gyrocopters after them to pick them down. This faction might get more scary as DLC comes out, but for now this should be an easy win as long as you know what you're doing.

*'''High Elves''': Don't let the War of the Beard fool you, this will be one of your hardest match ups. High Elves have a lot of things that threaten you, but the things to fear the most would be their Chariots, Mages, White Lions and <s>Sisters of Averlorn</s> (they do magic damage so their AP isn't as useful as you think). Seriously, any High Elf player who knows what they're doing is going to spam White Lions and it is going to SUCK. Your best bet is to spam either Gyrocopters or Cannons and spread the field. Force the High Elves to have to either attack your artillery emplacements one at a time, allowing your others to fire freely, or use your air power and artillery to spread them apart and pick off pockets. Hammerers also have a niche in this match up, because they beat White Lions pretty hard one-on-one and with support from guns or chaff, they can go toe to toe with Swordmasters (Though don't count on that). Of course, these plans aren't perfect. There's a 99% chance they will bring Alarielle for Tempest and heals to deal with Gyros and they have plenty of mobility to get at your cannons to give the White Lions time to get in. Sadly, this is one of those match ups where even if you bring the most optimized Anti Elgi list possible, there's still a pretty decent chance you'll lose. Avoid this match up if you can.

*'''Khorne''': It's Khorne, c'mon. Warriors of chaos with somehow even less ranged and even killier once they reach your front lines. Bring plenty of armor-piercing infantry and ranged. If you want to live, protect your artillery from Khorne's furies and calvary.

*'''Kislev''': Kislev's big weakness is that their ranged firepower is also their melee power due to hybrid units, and while this seems great at first glance, they sacrifice both elements to have the other. Your artillery and ranged firepower will dump all over Kislev, your biggest concern are War Bears and Sleds, to which you should apply Slayers. Focus down the wizards and you'll out-brutalize Kislev in good time.

*'''Lizardmen''': Lizardmen are a bit of a mixed bag. On one hand, you can scoff at all the Skinks as they ping impotently off of your armor (unless they're the Red-Crested variety). On the other, Saurus are just as stubborn as you are and will take days to chew through without good AP. Bring some Hammerers to eek out an advantage in the inevitable grindfest you'll end up in. Take advantage of the Lizardmen's dearth of ranged firepower and massacre their forces with Irondrakes and Thunderers, while your Dwarf Warriors hold their front line at bay. You have excellent anti-monster units in the form of your Giant Slayers who absolutely will butcher any big dinosaur thrown into your ranks so long as you have some chaff to help trap and soak the damage the beasties can toss about. Though Skinks will largely prove a minor nuisance at best to a majority of your forces, you will ''definitely'' want to screen your (Giant) Slayers from the Skirmishing variety. Key players to watch out for are going to be the Slann Mage-Priests, Skink Priests and Kroxigors. Slann, especially fire/high Slann and Heavens Skink Priests can wreak utter havoc upon your forces with the myriad of vortex spells they can toss out, like candy from a parade float and they should absolutely be prioritized if you find them on the field. (Sacred) Kroxigors, if fielded, are surprisingly vicious anti-infantry monsters and will bowl over a majority of the infantry they're pointed at. Giant Slayers and Trollhammer Irondrakes serve as a solid counter, but you'll still want to swamp the Kroxigors in chaff to mitigate the damage they deal in turn.

*'''Norsca''': This is an easy fight for you. All of that monster hunting anti-large equipment the Norscans bring is going to fly right over your head as you bury your axes in their unarmoured pecs. Bring plenty of Cannons and Bolt Throwers to shoot down enemy Mammoths and bring some Irondrakes to shoot down anything else. Norscans are usually unarmoured, so you can trade your Thunderers for Quarrelers for the better range. Stick to the basics and you'll do fine.

*'''Nurgle''': Holy shit, a faction that might actually be slower than you! And it seems like you will have a hefty advantage as they don't really have a lot of ways to stop your artillery. The biggest thing you will probably have to worry about is their air force, and Furies and Rotflies will be gunning for that back line. Keep some Slayers near your guns, and get ready to surround them if they try to land. After that you just got to deal with Nurgle's rush of Plaguebearers and Nurglings, and I hope you're ready for nothing to ever die ever because that's likely what is gonna happen when Dawi and Nurgle clash. On the ground, Plague Toads and Pox Riders will likely be your biggest threat with their anti-infantry, but they're also big models, so guns and Slayers should do the trick. Expect a Herald as the commander, and if he's dumb enough to bring a Great Unclean One, laugh and shoot it to pieces. With the new debuffs fire damage does to healing, it might also be wise to break out the Irondrakes and Flame Cannons -- you'll have plenty of time to lob napalm at those shambling hordes of Plaguebearers.
** CoC DLC has brought some changes with access to marked WoC units for Nurgle; the units you will definitely see in this match-up now include Nurgle-marked Chaos Knights, Nurgle-marked Chaos Chariots, Nurgle-marked Chaos Warriors/Chosen with Great Weapons and Nurgle Marauder Horsemen with throwing axes. Knights & Chariots are especially a threat, as they will survive long enough from their speed+armour+Nurgle Mark to get behind your lines and wipe artillery or rear-charge your line infantry. Great weapon Warriors/Chosen, while still vulnerable to your guns when getting to your lines, are both units that have respectable chances of beating your units in the grind with their standard WoC stats, but now plus the Nurgle Mark. The Nurgle Warshrine is a strong support piece for the army, but like a GUO its something Dwarfs can delete so easily that you really should not see it. Generally expect Nurgle armies facing you to have a decent share of Nurgle-marked Mortal units from WoC now, unless your opponent hates themselves.

*'''Ogre Kingdoms''': This match is either gonna be your easiest or your hardest, as this comes down to the skill of you, the Ogre player, and what units you brought to the table. The Ogres have massive charge bonuses, but a lot of your units have charge defense, however unlike other factions, the Ogres will only lose half due to their Ogre Charge trait. The biggest threat the Ogres bring to you is their artillery, and if you leave them be they'll reap a devasting toll on your infantry. The good news is, that with the exception of Leadbelchers, all their artillery are a single model. Have your Cannons and Gyrocopters focus them down and you are good to go, or so you would think. Besides the Gnoblars, Ogres are all monster units, which means two things. One is that your artillery and Slayers will have a field day, but two is that their shockingly fast speed means they're gonna out run you and try to outmaneuver you at every opportunity. Your army should be a good balance of Longbeards, or if you are pinching pennies, Dwarf Warriors, they all have charge defense and can help hold the charging balls of lubber back. This is one of the match up where having a ton of Slayers is a good thing, and stack up on them to defend your back lines and cut the Ogres down to size. Your artillery should consist of two, maybe three Cannons to take out artillery and thin their numbers. Irondrakes with Trollhammer Torpedoes won't be a bad call, but they're on the pricey end. Besides some of their units, bring at least two, or simply one unit of Thunderers at most, because a lot of their stuff is unarmored, your main missile troop should be Quarrelers, they're cheap and will have a good time turning Ogres into pin-cushions and are strong enough to fend off Sabertusks. Your artillerys targeting priority should look something like this: artillery units (Ironblasters first, then Leadbelchers), Stonehorns, and finally, everything else. This should be the only match up where you shouldn't bother bringing Miners with Blasting Charges. The only thing they'll have an effect on is Gnoblars and strictly that, which is a waste of cash and will earn you a grudge for being wasteful. Now get out there and strike out some grudges agaisnt the fat bastards!

*'''Skaven''': This is probably the closest we'll get to a 40k-esque matchup (you know, <strike>aside the irony of neither the [[Squats|Dwarfs]] or Skaven being in that setting</strike> [[Leagues of Votann|The Kin has declared a Grudge against the manling who wrote that]]). Between your guns and artillery and their guns and artillery, most of the damage either of you will be dealing to each other will be done from afar. A majority of the Skaven infantry is quite helpless against your frontline infantry, but you'll have a hell of a time pinning anything down with the Skavens quicker movement speeds. Grudge Throwers are going to be king against most Skaven infantry builds, while Bolt Throwers or Cannons should be fielded to snipe any Warp-Lighting Cannons, Plagueclaw Catapults or Hellpit Abominations they have downfield. Warplock Jezzails will be a priority target to focus fire down, as are Warpfire Throwers and Poison Wind Globadiers, should they start getting too close. Aside utilizing their missile units against them, Skaven have absolutely no aerial presence, meaning your Gyrocopters will have virtually free reign to gun down rats at will.

*'''Slaanesh''': A bad day for you all around. It's become apparent, that if you're unlucky enough to run into Slaanesh, you're going to want to forego ranged firepower almost entirely, Miners with Blasting Charges and Ironbreakers will trade efficiently, maybe a safety pick of Thunderers to deal with a Keeper Of Secrets, but AP on everything, Furies, Spawn and chariots will just pulverize your formations in one of the most one-sided setups in the game right now.

*'''Tomb Kings''': The good news is that Tomb Kings don't like fire, and you have fire aplenty. Brimstone Gun-equipped Gyrocoptors are your fastest fire-delivery system, but Irondrakes and Flame Cannons are useful as well. The bad news is, that you don't like chariots, and they have chariots aplenty. Use every trick you can to soften up the chariots before they hit your lines; but it's unlikely you'll be able to stop them all. Grab some Giant Slayers to finish off the ones that survive your barrage and hope it's enough to keep them down. Tomb Kings infantry is no match for you, so you should build your army against their monsters and chariots.

*'''Tzeentch''': Ooh, here is somebody that's going to hate you. Tzeentch units are squishy and their ranged units only have middling range and are better for kiting. He also has no artillery other than Soul Grinders, few big monsters outside of Lords of Change, and relies heavily on spamming spells to activate their army abilities. Bring a Runelord or Thorek on an Anvil of Doom and laugh as their casters explode. Otherwise, pound them into dust with artillery, as they have few answers to an army with better range than them. Just guard the back line against Furies and Doom Knights and don't bother with air units, they'll get shot down in short order.

*'''Vampire Coast''': The most common Vampire Coast strategy is to bunker up with a large number of cheap ranged units and heavy artillery. If that sounds familiar, it's only because it's the same thing you like to do, you're just better at it. Bring plenty of Cannons and some Slayers to deal with the enemy monsters (hint: kill the Necrofex Colossi first). Once the big monsters have been dealt with, the pirates are basically just an inferior version of you, clumps of Quarrelers and Thunderers are plenty to take down the Zombies. And remember not to bunker up too tightly; you may have magic resistance but Winds of Death will still hurt.

*'''Vampire Counts''': Virtually nothing that makes up the rank and file of the Vampire Counts will pose a significant threat to you. Skeletons and Zombies will only serve to slow down your already plodding advance and only deal any meaningful "damage" to you simply by sponging your limited ranged firepower meant for something else. The only standard units that you'll find yourself at a significant disadvantage against will be the Cairn and Hex Wraiths, given your general lack of magical damage. You'll want to engage them with missile attacks for maximum effect and make sure that you are braced for their charges. The main thing you should be focused on taking down will be the Lords and Heroes leading the army; without them, the undead hordes will quickly fall apart (literally). They also pose the single biggest threat to everything you have, as their Lore of Death casters can delete swathes of your army with a single well placed cast if you are positioned carelessly.

*'''Wood Elves''': Wood Elves are an extremely annoying foe who are fundamentally the exact opposite of you. Their infantry can run circles around yours and they can deal frightening amounts of damage against their intended targets, but you'll snap their twiggy spines if you whip 'em with your beards. In general, you're going to be engaged in a very tedious game of "keep away", where the Wood Elves are going to be dancing just outside of your reach while their Glade Guard and Waywatchers pepper you with AP arrows and occasionally test your flanks for weaknesses via Wild Rider/Great Stag Knight cycle charges. Fortunately, you do have a couple tools the elves don't: Artillery. Grudge Throwers excel against WE infantry and can discourage them from trying to camp too far away, while Bolt Throwers and Flame Cannons will make mince-meat of the cavalry/Forest Spirits that may try to break through your lines. Speaking of Forest Spirits, Irondrakes will ''incinerate'' them. Slayers also help against the bigger tree spirits in theory, but the ranged power the Wood Elves bring make them a dicey proposition. As far as their melee infantry options are concerned, the only ones that majorly threaten you are the Bladesingers; their anti-armor magical attacks will scythe through your armor will jaw-dropping speed. Use Thunderers to soften them up on the charge then use Slayers to cut them down swiftly.

===Domination===
General Tier Rank: '''F'''

You are just SO FUCKING SLOW. You opponent is going to get to the point first, no question about it and most armies have plenty of ways to roadblock you in order to stop you from getting on them. While few factions will be able to contest you in a head on charge for the midpoint, once they start going for the side points you will have no way to out contest them. Important to note that there are some maps that you won't get completely dumpstered automatically. The more choke points that are on a map, the better it is for you because then the enemy will be more forced to try to take you head on instead of just avoid direct contact with you in an attempt to cap more points. However, even then there's no way you can outmaneuver your enemy unless they fall asleep at their computer out of boredom. Don't play Dwarfs in Domination until they get some major buffs, a DLC, or rework that will help them move around the map better.

However if you still decide to stay committed to playing dwarfs, the general tip is seize two caps at least and have a squadron of gyrocopters and bombers to harass the foe, ironbreakers are king here, jam them on a point and laugh as your opponent struggles to get them off, rangers and miners are key here as they are the only units with vanguard deployment (this includes the ROR ironbreakers) to delay the foe by brawling with them as your slower units get into position or to reinforce your troops if needed, slayers are necessary here as besides gyrocopters, their the fastest thing you got, bring along 3, 4 if needed, to both delete cav or monsters too big for their britches and do aforementioned delaying tactics, for artillery, on smaller maps, organ guns and flame cannons will be an excellent infantry/cavalry begone tool for clearing out points that are infested with enemy troops, as per the norm, bring a cannon to deal with enemy artillery and snipe monsters regardless of the map size, on longer maps, the grudge-thrower will be a much better alternative for clearing out points, but organ guns and flame cannons are a good deterrent for defending points, as they’ll delete blobs, just make sure there safe from enemy cav and flyers, however the one weakness as listed above, is your slowness, you need to be smart if you want to consistently win domination as dwarfs, assume a box formation as units in said shape, turn about faster and thus let them react to threats flanking around or move to different points faster if it’s necessary (keep in mind, it does not increase movement speed, it just hastens how fast they turn), while it is vulnerable to artillery fire, your cannons should already be firing at said artillery, follow this guide somewhat well and proceed to wipe every smug grin off with an axe, show every YouTuber good or otherwise how wrong they were as you strike out grudges and get vengeance for every domination tier list that put you in F tier!

===Campaign Strategies===
*'''Karaz-A-Karak''': Karaz-A-Karak starts out with a solid base economy and a protected position, with your flanks covered by minor dwarven factions and only one Greenskin faction as your initial enemy. However, that start is deceivingly simple at first; once Grimgor and Queek get going, your position will become increasingly precarious if you're not careful. Your biggest weakness is easily your very slow growth, as the Greenskins and Skaven often will have higher tier units much sooner than you do. Making the jump from Tier 3 to 4 as soon as you can is your top priority. Once your scary lategame units arrive, you can start to dominate the Southlands and expand in any direction you damn please.
**'''Pick Gronbrimdal (Mortal Empires only)''': There is no reason to ever pick Thorgim over Grombrindal as your starting LL. Grombrindal comes with a much better selection of starting units (Gyrocopters, Irondrakes and Thunderers) and his blue skill tree might be one of the most blatantly overpowered things in the game on its own, as Grombrindals variants of the perks not just affect his army, but your entire faction. Thorgrim can be recruited later down the line regardless.
**'''Don't get bogged down''': The initial 50 turns of any campaign might just be called "get ready for Grimgor". While you can expand quickly at the start, it is ill advised (and very tempting) to stray too far from your Capital and end up with your armies battering against your starting enemies while Grimgor happily carves a path straight towards Karaz-A-Karak. Losing Karaz-A-Karak becomes a win condition in this case; if you can successfully defend it, the Greenskins are finished, if you lose it, you can restart a new campaign.

'

*Clan Angrund''' In immortal empires Belegar's difficulty level has been severely reduced, on turn one as soon as you take your first settlement you can full-confederate Karak Izor instantly. After that it's the usual hop and skip to Karak-Eight-Peaks, however with it in Skarsnik's hands now, it's significantly easier to take as Skarsnik doesn't start with a full 20 stack army unlike the 'Crooked Moon Mutineers' from Warhammer 2.
[[Category:Total Warhammer]] {{Total War Warhammer Tactics}}

Total War Warhammer/Tactics/Dwarfs

2023-06-12T16:33:49Z

2A02:1810:4E2C:A900:DC0E:597F:F427:CBEB: /* Legendary Heroes (Clan Angrund Only) */

{{Topquote|Kazukhan-kazakit-ha! (Look out, the Dwarfs are on the warpath!)|Game battle chant for Dwarfs, if you think about it, it should be look <s>down</s> THAT'S A GRUDGE!}}
This is the tactics page for the Total War: Warhammer version of The Dwarfs.

==Why play Dwarfs?==
*Because you want to sit and watch as your enemies are blasted away while coming towards you.
*Cause you're under 5'5 and want '''vengeance''' for all the short jokes.
*You don't want to do too much micro, so an army without much in the way of mobility and cavalry doesn't bother you as much.
*You enjoy having infantry that won't die after being slapped by a wet noodle.
*Slay everything without a beard!!
*FLAMETHROWERS!!!

===Pros===
*'''Durability''': You are a tank faction. Most of your units are categorized with high armour, melee defense and leadership. Even your tier one and chaff are very tanky compared to counterparts from other factions. This is further supplemented by the innate magic resist many of your units have, which ''slightly'' compensates for your otherwise complete lack of magic. Additionally, with their naturally high leadership, dwarfs do not usually break unless hopelessly outnumbered or if you screw up massively by getting cavalry charged in the rear. Frankly, your units will hold out forever.
**Your magic resistance got nerfed in the third game to ''only'' resist magical spells. Still useful, but now units with magic attacks, I.E Daemons, are going to be way better at cracking you open.
*'''Range''': Guns, guns and more guns! Dwarfs have some of the best blackpowder units in the entire game. Thunderers and Cannons can lay a whooping on anything they are firing on, and their artillery isn't anything to sneer at. Even their non-AP range units are very good for their price, and it's not hard for them to earn their points back as long as they are defended.
*'''If they get close, Nut 'em!''': As if being being one of the best factions at shooting was not enough, their missile units can also hold their own in close quarters better than most.
*'''Airforce''': Gyrocopters with their anti large can get you control over the air, and their ability to kite monsters into oblivion is a good skill to have. Even Gyrobombers have a niche for their blob killing capabilities after recent buffs.
*'''Runes''': Where other races rely on the fickle Winds of Magic, you have your reliable runes. Runes supply surprisingly good buffs and debuffs that can help your army out, making them a great way to make sure your infantry stays in the fight a bit longer. The fact that they aren't limited by a power reserve also means that they'll remain a viable option well into the latter stages of a fight, where other factions might begin to tap out of their mystical power.
*'''Anti-large''': You laugh when the enemy brings big monsters. With all your AP missiles, Anti Large artillery and slayers, you have the one of the easiest times killing monsters out of any faction in the game.
*'''Strong Economy''': It's campaign specific but yeah, it turns out the species who's renowned for being the best at making shit is also one of the best at making money. The resource building chains go up to level IV instead of stopping at level III, you can mass produce Dwarf Beer anywhere. Putting together Doomstacks of Top Tier Dawi troops is easier.
*'''Good for Beginners''': Everyone was just starting once, if you are new to Warhammer Total War or just Total War in general the Dawi are (ironically enough) forgiving. Something like the Wood Elves is fragile and has a limited margin for error, Dwarfs on the other hand have more of a fudge factor in most match ups. Not to say that it's easy mode playing dwarfs, but the likelihood of things going pear shaped in a second is lower.

===Cons===
*'''Lack of Mobility''': With no Cav, monsters and slow infantry, Dwarfs are the least mobile faction in the game. You will spend the majority of the game standing still.
*'''Lack of Magic''': Though your most recent rework makes your runes a damn good alternative, you don't really have magic. This can pose a problem when you face similarly physically durable armies in battle and lack a reliable, magical alternative for damage. Additionally, though you defensively have a 25% resistance to the arcane, many large vortex spells will still sting quite a bit and your complete lack of magical healing means it'll be hard to bounce back from the damage you do take.
*'''Chariots''': Chariots are the bane of a Dwarf players existence. They don't have any real way to lock them down and, as you'd expect, AP anti infantry can really kill what the Dwarfs want to do on the battlefield. Due to the rework to how bracing and knock down works, this isn’t as bad as before, but chariots can still be a problem
*'''Predictability''': Most veteran players know what's going to happen when Dwarfs are picked. They are going to go for a cheap, numerous and sturdy front line and a lot of guns and artillery. This means that Dwarfs are easy to plan for as they only have one real viable tactic. Building an army around fighting Dwarfs is something players from all races know how to do.
*'''Lack of Good Lord Options''': Do you like the Runelord or Thorek? No? Well you better start because in multiplayer they're your only viable options. Grombrindal is an ok duelist but honestly Dwarf lords in general kind of suck. With no mounts and no way to stick to their targets it's hard for them to get anything done. This problem got better with the Twisted and the Twilight due to the changes to knockdown effects, but sticking to targets will still be hard
*'''Hard campaign''': With all the changes to the factions around them, the Dawi have fallen on some pretty hard times. The lifetime of WH2 dotted the landscape around Karaz-A-Karak alone with a huge number of guaranteed enemies that you will have to look out for, with your most reliable allies in the Empire being very far away. The other subfactions don't fare much better and your slow growth seriously hurts your ability to expand, especially when compared with your most dominant enemies, the Greenskins of the Badlands and Clan Mors further down the road.
*'''Bad in Domination''': Turns out your stubby little legs makes it really hard for you to capture objectives. Due to your lack of mobility you can't effectively capture points since other factions can just out race you to them and get more units on them. As such, you're widely considered the weakest faction in Domination.
*'''DLC''': A con for everyone, but fortunately you get off easier than many others. Unfortunately, a couple of your best units, namely Runelords and Rangers, are in fact locked behind DLC and if you want to really use your Dwarfs to the fullest, you'll need to pay the toll.

==Universal Traits==

*'''The Great Book of Grudges''': The fact that the sacred Dammaz Kron went unmentioned on this pages for so long merits an entry on its own. The Book of Grudges documents every slight committed against your faction, including legendary grudges that you start out with. Whenever something bad happens, i.e. you lose a settlement, get raided or a hostile faction repeatedly trespasses on your turf without you allowing it, it merits an entry in the book. These entries can (and will) accumulate over time, and depending on how much your Dorfs disliked the transgression, will vary in severity, which fills up a meter that gives you some penalties and some bonusses. High severity from unresolved Grudges gives you minor public order and research speed penalties, but it also gives all of your armies a charge bonus (since the Dwarfs are so pissed off) and increases the chance of Slayers and Giant Slayers popping up in your Regiments of Renown pool, where they can then be recruited instantly into your armies. Resolving Grudges and Legendary Grudges (such as retaking Karak Eight Peaks as Belegar Ironhammer) also earns you powerful bonusses (money, Oathgold, small buffs for the entire faction ) and special Runes.
*'''Oathgold''': The secondary resource of the Dwarfs. Practically identical to the Mortuary Cult of the Tomb Kings, with the key difference being that the Dwarfs can make much more stuff with Oathgold and that the stuff is much more abundant. Oathgold is earned through resolving Grudges, doing missions and quests, Gold Mines and some special buildings such as the Brightstone Mine in Mount Gunbad. Oathgold, combined with trade goods, can be used to create items for your Lords and Heroes, which makes it downright trivial to kit out every single character on the map with some special gizmos to make them really powerful. Oathgold can also be used to make Character and Banner Runes, the former can be applied as equipment to individual characters (with up to 3 individual runes at maximum), the latter functions like Banners that you can give units to give them special bonusses and abilities.
*'''Expert Charge Defense''': Barring Slayers, every single one of your units has Expert Charge Defense, which nullifies charge bonusses and also the momentum of units charging into your staunch line of angry Dwarfs.
*'''Magic Resistance''': Every Dwarf has a built in 25% Magic Resist (Spell Resist in WH3). Consult the main page for WHFB Dwarfs as to why.

==Legendary Lords and Subfactions==
*'''Thorgrim Grudgebearer:''' The high king himself, and the only large non-war machine unit in your roster, as he is carried on a massive throne sled by some burly dwarfs, Thorgrim isn't huge on offence, better than say mid-tier combat lords, but he's mostly just a hard to kill brick of leadership. Dwarfs in range of him just become slightly harder to break, which isn't saying much given their default morale, and he's not easily sniped. This results in him being kind of underwhelming, you know he's not going to die like a bitch, but you also know that he's not exactly going to recoup even a quarter of his cost. Is kind of safe in campaign play for beginners, but Grombrindal is overall superior. - Pass.
*'''Ungrim Ironfist:''' The Slayer King, bane of anything taller than six feet, Ungrim is the opposite of Thorgrim; all offence, with low defence. Ungrim is actually pretty good in terms of being a hero-killer and monster-hunter, he's not going to solo Tyrion or Kroq-Gar, and don't even think of monster lords like Kholek or monstrous mounts such as a Tomb King on a war sphinx, without a unit to bog them down. The problem with Ungrim is that while he can throw hands and live up to his title, he eats a lot of damage for a dwarf, or just in general for a combat lord, he's easy to snipe with massed missiles if caught in the open, and while he can butcher most things sent his way, he'll only be able to do this once or twice in a battle before he's at serious risk of dying. Don't let that 120 armour & unbreakable make you think he's a tank, Ungrim's Melee Defence is quite low for a combat lord, and that low dwarf speed means he can by kited to death. Thorgrim lacks the damage to recoup his cost, Ungrim lacks the defence to recoup his costs. If playing with an ally that has access to Lore of Life he can be kept alive, but you're asking a lot of resources to support the Slayer King. - Pass.
*'''Grombrindal:''' THE WHITE DWARF, Grombrindal doesn't bring anything really special to the table, he's a decent duelist, although lacking the balls-to-the-wall offence of Ungrim Ironfist, Grombrinal is nowhere near as risky for a combat lord. The flashbomb ability can lockdown mobile heroes and give the white dwarf a few easy hits. Doesn't quite bring much for the rest of the army, but is the best legendary lord for cost-benefit tradeoffs. He can fight, he can survive, and he can make the entire army Unbreakable with a reusable map-wide buff. - Niche but competitive in that niche. In Campaign, he is easily the best LL the Dwarfs offer. His blue skill tree affects ''your entire faction'' and the four blessings you can choose every 20 turns (10 after picking a specific skill) are all very powerful, a whopping +25% Research Rate is no joke, as are +10 Melee Attack and Defense for every unit in Grombrindals army.
*'''Belegar Ironhammer:'''(DLC) Belegar is really just a wall, he's harder to kill than Thorgrim as they have comparable stats, but he has a silver shield for 55% missile resistance. That's all. Just an insanely hard to kill lord, sure his offence isn't terrible, being better than Thorgrim's on base stats and a nice buff can be popped to go higher. But honestly you're paying a lot for a lord that won't die, and generally speaking Dwarfs in Total War: Warhammer aren't a faction that is centred around their generals or heroes. No real wizards to throw high-impact spell effects, no mobile heroes that can exploit small gaps to flank units or hunt down supporting pieces like buffers, wizards or artillery crews. The only upshot to taking Belegar's subfaction in multiplayer is getting access the ancestor heroes who are damned hard to kill, but are also the only dwarf units that are scared of magic damage, which can sort of be a mind-games thing because the default assumption to seeing Clan Angrund picked is that ancestor heroes are on the field, so grab some magic damage to delete them, but then seeing that there are no ghost dwarfs means that the magic damage is actually a big waste considering all dwarfs have 25% Magic Resistance. - Pass.
*'''Thorek Ironbrow:'''(FLC): With the rework comes a new LL and Thorek serves this role, being the latest (and most likely last) new contender in the Lustrian Thunderdome in the Vortex Campaign, and starting at the southernmost tip of the map in Karak Zorn on Mortal Empires. He serves as a supercharged Runelord with access to a unique mount that messes quite a bit with enemy spellcasting and improved Runic Magic on his own part. In the campaign, his legendary conservativeness translates into bonusses for "traditional" Dwarfen ranged units like Quarrelers and Grudge Throwers. Not to worry though, since he starts with a Rune of Burning that makes the Catapult projectiles [[Awesome|FUCKING EXPLODE]] and dramatically increases the combat value of Quarrelers in his own Army quite significantly (arguably making them even better than Thunderers). His campaign goal revolves around finding several lost Dwarfen artifacts, which can then be used to craft powerful buffs for your whole faction. [[Derp|He also can make enemy casters explode.]] - Best Multiplayer lord pick.

==Units==
===Generic Lords===
*'''Dwarf Lord:''' No, just no, he suffers from the same issue that the Legendary Lords suffer from, being too slow. But wait there's more, the generic Lord is easier to kill in combat, provides less army support, and does less damage. He's not even the cheapest option to help save costs. I mean he has a shield, but its only bronze. Unless you've got some kind of bet riding on a battle and there's a specific stipulation that you cannot use any other Lord, screw the money because he's too crap. That said compared to generic foot Lords in other factions he's quite difficult to kill, which is more advice for fighting Dwarf Lords in campaign really. PASS!
*'''Runelord:''' (DLC) Yes, yes yes. The one competitive General in multiplayer, the Runelord is just a walking bubble of passive buffs that make your low tier units good, and your good infantry units even better. Has good active abilities, like Master Rune of Oath & Steel which gives +30 armour to all dwarfs in range, or the Rune of Speed which adds 45% speed and 24 melee attack to all dwarfs in range. This is the Lord pick that supports the dwarf army, and don't think he's some kind of wizard that dies when someone looks at him funny, while the melee defence is low at 40, the Runelord has the same 120 armour as the other Lords, plus up to 35% missile resistance, sharing 20% of that with nearby allies. Slapping him on an Anvil of Doom gives a special ability that causes enemy casters to automatically miscast for minor damage when near him. TL;DR fucks magic, gets buffs. - Good if you want Thorek but a bit cheaper.

===Legendary Heroes (Clan Angrund Only)===
All [[Clan Angrund]] has such a strong relationship with their ancestors, they come back as ghosts. Like all ghosts, they have a 75% physical resistance instead of magic resistance, with magic attacks, Unbreakable, but no armor and less health than normal. They have Fear and Terror making them good at chasing the enemy off. They themselves are weak to magic attacks, but who takes that much offense magic against Dwarfs anyway?

*'''King Lunn Ironhammer:''' is one of the two ghost Thanes, being the offensive one, with slightly more Melee attack than a normal Thane.
*'''Halkenhaf Stonebeard:''' the other ghost Thane, being the most defensive of the par with significantly lower melee attack but a very high defense of 65 and silver shield, letting him minge with enemies for a protracted time to proc terror routs.
*'''Throni Ironbrow:''' Most likely to take as he is a Runesmith, so someone that needs protection while also being in the front lines.
*'''Dramar Hammerfist:''' the ghost engineer so paying extra for a harder to kill gun lines buffer and better at chasing away those that try to disrupt them.

===Heroes===
*'''Master Engineer:''' Basically a must if you're running more than 2 artillery pieces, buffs artillery, has a decent sniper rifle of his own, not great in a fight with anything beyond hound packs and light cavalry, so don't expect him to be an effective guard for the cannons he's buffing. However if there is another unit nearby casting Entrenchment right before they rout will make the unit hold the line and fight even after being routed. On campaign they also boost your army's mobility. Aaaaaand the Dwarf Rework happened, buffing him even further with the ability of the Vampirate Gunnery Wight to restore lost ammo to artillery pieces for up to five times. Just too good to miss out on if you're bringing a bunch of cannons (and who doesn't, honestly).
*'''Runesmith:''' Basically a squishier version of the Runelord, has many of the same buffs, both passive and active. With the Dwarf rework, these guys have gone from being merely decent to amazing. While utilizing a rune puts every other rune on a shared cooldown, this only applies per caster; having multiple Runesmiths allows you to stack multiple buffs simultaneously or across multiple units without having to wait out the full 60 second global cooldown. They might not necessarily be an auto-include persay, but having one or two of these guys in your army is strongly recommended.
*'''Thane:''' While they still suffer from being slow, Thanes can be used more aggressively than Legendary Lords. Kit them out with the Rune of Slowness to gimp enemy mobility, or give them the Ironbeard's Ring and coordinate with a source of fire damage: Flame Cannons, Dragonback Slayers, Warriors of Dragonfire Pass, basic Irondrakes, or Brimstone Gyrocopters, all of these will deal serious damage to units inside the debuff aura.

===Infantry===
*'''Miners''': The closest thing to cannon fodder in the Dwarf Roster, miners are cheap AP units. Also give "speed" and breadth to Dawi list by vanguarding.
*'''Dwarf Warriors''': Did you know that a unit of Dwarf Warriors costs 475 gold but can hold against 3 units of Empire Swordsmen, costing 400 gold each, for just over 2 minutes and racking up roughly 90-100 kills before dying/breaking? Dwarf Warriors aren't great, just good, and are very much just a shield wall frontline. Dwarf Warriors are very cost-effective starting units. They will trade positively against most infantry that are tier 1-3 excluding units with high AP values or anti-infantry buffs. Dwarf Warriors aren't the same as elite heavy infantry however, they will break in time, if rear charged, if attacked by great weapon units, if hit with leadership debuffs, or if attacked by characters. This is a unit that buys time for a unit in the second line to get in position to assist, do not assume you can just deploy them as a single line and have artillery sit safely behind them.
**'''Warriors of Dragonfire Pass'''(ROR): Slightly better warriors that deal fire damage in combat, not a guaranteed pick most of the time, but good against any faction that is vulnerable to fire, consider pairing with a Thane carrying Ironbeard's Ring to boost damage.
*'''Dwarf Warriors (Great Weapons)''': You know how Dwarf Warriors can hold frontlines for a time but need a second line unit to assist them, this is cheapest of the second line units. Regular warriors have shields, 40 Melee Defence, and charge defence against large units, Warriors with Great Weapons don't have those defences, they get armour piercing damage which is the kind of offence needed to make up for the vanilla warriors' shortcomings. Don't try and use them as a frontline unit, and replace them when you can with other melee infantry.
*'''Longbeards''': Warriors +1 really, they buff the leadership of other units (it's the generic Encourage passive so no stacking with Lords), so consider mixing them with warriors. Cost-wise your mostly paying for better Melee Defence, better Leadership, the leadership aura, and Immune to Psychology compared to vanilla Warriors. A common question is which is better for cost, Longbeards or Warriors, but outside of fighting undead armies that have tons of fear/terror effects, the answer to the question is; use both. While the differences between the two units are obvious in comparison, to the player on the other side of the battlefield it doesn't matter much because a Dwarf line is still a solid formation that is hard to break. Longbeards work good in the wings to buff leadership in the flanks, and having warrior units means you can save gold for more missile units and artillery.
*'''Longbeards (Great Weapons)''': While the difference between shield Warriors and shield Longbeards isn't much, the great weapon variant favours the Longbeards, which come with Charge Defense and Armor-Piercing (but no target specialization). In MP, where every gold coin counts, if all you need is cheap AP, take the Warriors, but if you want something tankier and able to encourage your dwarfs to hold out a bit longer, take these guys.
**'''The Grumbling Guard'''(ROR): Not too bad, stat wise its a bit more armour & melee attack, 10 more leadership, and 13 more Melee Defence, which puts them at a whopping 51 Melee Defence. You don't get any improved damage output with these guys, instead you get an ability that replenishes 9% of vigour for them and nearby allies. This may not sound like much, but fatigue debuffs are crippling for units, and Dwarfs rely on grinding things out so even a small vigour buff to some units is good even if it just moves them from exhausted to very tired. But wait, this ability has infinite uses and a low cooldown so spam it away. While Hammerers do the same job but better, the Grumbling Guard are fantastic for keeping Ironbreakers in better condition than their enemies.
*'''Slayers''': Slayers are kind of weird. They're unbreakable, quick (for a Dwarf), hit hard, and do a lot of damage with no consideration to survivability. This means that they can seriously fuck up higher-tier units but on the same time are vulnerable to cannon fodder. It does not matter if you're a crappy goblin with a crappy spear, it's getting through a Slayer's hide as much as a Chosen's Daemonforged Axe. When using Slayers, hold them back so that other units, especially ones with charge defense, take the brunt of the charge before moving the slayers to counter-attack, and while it might cost you the charge bonus, having them attack through the buffer unit really improves the lifespan of your slayers (Probably much to their chagrin). Note that if you ever leave them in the open, missile units just have to imagine shooting them to wipe the unit, which is an expensive mistake. Also a definite must take against vampire counts and Tomb Kings with all their fear effects but do not ever think about using them against Vampire Pirates because they will get shot to pieces before any fear/terror units get close for the unbreakable to matter. Also, leave them at home against Wood Elves, or if you have fore-knowledge that your opponent likes horse-archer tactics.
*With the Dwarf rework that dropped together with Thorek Ironbrow, they went from terrible in Single Player to a pretty good choice for the early game, since you can now recruit them anywhere as long as your grudge meter is up. It also makes unlimited Slayer Doomstacks lead by Ungrim Ironfist a terrifying sight to behold.
**'''Dragonback Slayers'''(ROR): Slayers with better MA & MD, and they get physical resistance on top of the shield defense. The real value comes with their passive that activates in melee, it gives them fire damage, fire resistance, and applies slow debuff and the flammable trait for weakness to fire (doesn't stack if the enemy already has the flammable trait, but will stack with other effects of a different name that reduce fire resistance). The physical resist, slow debuff and the combo of fire damage and flammable debuff makes this unit a generally better pick over vanilla slayers, note that they do not get the fire resistance outside of combat so getting hit by flaming missiles outside of combat will hurt, the lore of fire spells are still subject to dwarf magic resistance though.
*'''Giant Slayers''': These are just super slayers, too costly to run a lot of. They will instantly blend light cavalry units like Marauder Horsemen or Ellyrian Reavers that dare to charge them, not that you should be using them to counter these units, it's just funny to see happen. Giant Slayers are basically Ungrim Ironfist as many Dwarfs instead of one. What they don't kill will be pretty close to death. Cannon fodder might counter slayers, but Giant Slayers dish out enough melee damage that you only need to worry about elite infantry and high mass units charging them. More vulnerable to shooting as they don't get the missile defense that Slayers get, these guys are expensive but do the job. Not recommended as a staple unit in army builds due to their cost, but good to pick if you're against monster or cavalry heavy armies.
*'''Hammerers''': Your well-armored, AP Damage dealing elite Dwarfs, not the same tank as a Longbeard but will deal serious AP damage. They've been reworked in the latest game, giving them substantially more health and magical(!) damage, meaning they're your best chance against Daemons and Treekin. **Still the same weaknesses as before, though: they're a Hammer (heh) in an Army of Anvils, so they'll mostly be pushing their way through your infantry
**Peak Gate Guard(ROR): The ultimate anti-armor unit, they go through heavily armored units like swordsmen through skavenslaves and then let other Dawi also participate in the fun.

===Ranged Infantry===
*'''Thunderers''': Like Empire handgunners, but you don't need to babysit them as much. A very useful unit even in the lategame that won't break the bank.
*'''Irondrakes:''' Where the fun begins. Ridiculously high damage output, solidly armoured. Need positioning to work right, but will absolutely demolish anything that you point them at. Their flamethrowers are considered artillery so they cannot be blocked by shields and inflict morale penalty upon anything they hit. They are surprisingly strong in melee against infantry if not deployed in a thin line because the back row can use their flamethrowers at point-blank, but not against cavalry as they'll pierce till the back row.
**'''The Skolder Guard'''(ROR): Replaces Lava for Steam to be an anti-armor unit. Much tougher than an Irondrakes with Physical resistance which is nice to have when the enemy gets a sneaky charge. They will multch full-plate units quickly given they have an even faster reload speed but watch out as you will also burn through their limited ammunition just as quickly. Against enemies with less armor you're better off using regular Irondrakes.
*'''Irondrakes (Trollhammer Torpedo)''': the Anti large version of the Irondrakes, having rocket launchers instead of Flamers. Often times Irondrakes can just melt through the armor of most things they are pointed at, sometimes they are Cavalry or monsters that have enough armor to shrug off that current of magma. Unlike regular Irondrakes they can shoot over units and obstacles. Don't be fooled by how their torpedoes explode, they don't do splash damage and should only attack infantry if you don't have anything bigger to shoot.

===Combined Infantry===
*'''Quarrellers''': Boring but practical. Like dwarf warriors, they're able to trade shots with the tier 1 ranged units of pretty much every other faction and winning because they come with shields on top of their dwarf armor. They also come with armor piercing, which makes them a budget option for shooting stuff like chaos warriors. However, they do less DPS per gold spent than similar units like empire crossbowmen and darkshards.
**As mentioned above, Thorek brings out the best in these guys, keeping them very relevant even to the late game. The shield variant is best used against missile-heavy factions like Wood Elves, but does nothing against Artillery.
*'''Quarrellers (Great Weapons)''': Similar to Quarrelers, except they give up shields in exchange for armor-piercing melee weapons. Won't win much in close combat, but they'll take down more enemies before they're overwhelmed, particularly against squishy units like harpies.
**Thorek buffs them to an insane degree to the point that when combined with all the relevant campaign bonuses, Quarrelers will become the core of your army. They're still not a frontline since they only have so many models in a unit, but 6-10 of these guys can outright delete anything that gives your Longbeards and Ironbreakers a hard time (Mammoths, stonehorns, even Rogue Idols). They also autoresolve very well, taking more losses than the shielded variant, but will take less losses than your frontline infantry.
*'''Miners (Blasting Charges)''': take that Cheap miner, then give them a single volley for bomb-throwing. Each model only gets one bomb, so make it count. Turn off ''Fire at Will'' and select the targets manually. A well-thrown Blasting Charge will decimate most charging infantry.
**'''Ekrund Miners'''(ROR): A regiment that Gets 3 Blasting Charges instead of 1. Depending on how well you managed them, that's paying less gold then recruiting 3 Blasting Charge Miners which matter very much in the gold restricted multiplayer.
*'''Ironbreakers''': The fact that Ironbreakers are one of the toughest units in the game would make them a key part of a Dawi late game army. Add to that blasting charges and you have something which can stomp most other infantry into the ground, blowing away a quarter of their hitpoints and ruining their charge before finishing off the survivors. Their only downside is that their damage in hand to hand is not that great, but that's what thunderers, slayers and artillery is for. NEVER let artillery, including artillery towers, target them. They're so slow they're target practice and they're no.1 priority as dwarfs don't have anything bigger.
**'''Norgrimlings Ironbreakers''':(ROR) Even better Ironbreakers, With bigger model size (so more bombes and unit health), a faster throwing arm, Vanguard, and Immune to Psychology. Overall a more powerful unit that can holds back the hords for longer while dealing more casualties.
*'''Rangers''': Sneaky Dwarf Quarrellers getting Vanguard and Stalk for a surprise Dwarf ambush. They have better speed to help with positioning and catching enemies at least when compared to other Dawi. They're armour is pretty good for most armies, but among Dwarfs they're on the lower end of defenses.
*'''Rangers (Great Weapons)''': Ranger equivalent of Quarrellers(Great Weapons) with one key difference; unlike the great weapon Quarreler the Rangers give up their crossbows entirely in favor of shorter ranged, higher AP throwing axes. Surprise AP flanking is a thing any Dwarf list could ask for. Keep in mind that each dwarf only carries 8 axes, so they'll run out much quicker than other rangers. Once they run out of throwing axes they become a decent anti-armour skirmishing unit, although their low defense means they need to chose their opponents carefully.
**'''Ulthar's Raiders'''(ROR) a unit your should be more careful with than just normal Rangers with Great Weapons, as they get the [[Witch Hunter]]'s ability to Mark a unit for death. You do get a fair amount of range despite having only infantry speed, being able to strip an enemy of a lot of their protection they had against ranged weapons. Good take if your using a Focus fire strategy, assuming your can keep the Raiders safe while making back their cost.
*'''Bugman's Rangers''' Surprisingly not a ROR. Improved Rangers, having the regenerative and drunkenness properties of Bugman's liquid courage. they are better at fighting off harassers while their improved shooting and HP recovery help them win archer fights. These are to Rangers as Longbeards are to Warriors: a straight upgrade assuming you can afford it. In MP, they can last longer without support and work best if you're good at micro. If not, you're probably better just leaving them at home in favor of more units of regular rangers.

===Cavalry===
Does not exist. See Slayers, Rangers and Air Units if you want something fast, you beardling.

===Artillery===
*'''Bolt Thrower:''' Your cheaper anti-large Artillery. More accurate and shoots faster than a cannon, but outclassed by them in splash and penetration power. Best used to take out elite cavalry and monsters in the early campaign.
*'''Grudge Thrower''': Your first artillery unit. Fills a role like an Empire Mortar as a long-range anti-infantry weapon giving it has the largest radius of splash damage on impact.
**'''Gob-Lobber (Grudge Thrower)(ROR)''': Like the Grudge Thrower, but better. Also has live Goblins bolted to the projectiles. Causes morale penalties to targets, which stacks with the penalty for being hit by artillery.
*'''Cannon:''' Your classic artillery. Slow to fire but harder to dodge, best used as an Anti-large weapon while also killing models in high armor units, through can have difficulties hitting if the enemy zigzags too much like most Artillery units.
*'''Organ Gun:''' An effective horse begone tool, with good armor piercing and a ton of cannon balls flying everywhere, cavalry will quickly and efficiently die off in droves as your foe rages, if there’s no cav to shoot, then this thing is good for pulping infantry and can do a decent job at eliminating chariots.
*'''Flame Cannon''' Jack-of-all-trades artillery. Great area damage to deal with blobs of infantry and while it doesn't cause AP damage, its base damage is high enough that it doesn't matter. Funny enough, its stats make it much better at breaking towers and walls than cannons.

===Air Units===
The closest thing to "cavalry". Flying Bombers. Fill a role as the fast-moving guns to shoot at enemy flanks and drop anti-infantry bombs. The rotor blades can also dish out a good amount of melee damage, but having almost no melee defense makes them relatively fragile despite having high armor. They are often safe in the air, but keep them away from other flyers and AP missiles. Despite this, they are absurdly fast having speed in the 200s to run from most problems (only Pegasus Knights or Hawk Riders could catch them without nets or debuffs). To use effectively will require some mico.

*'''Gyrobomber:''' Your dedicated bomber which sacrifices other aspects to be the best at that. As a single mobile unit dedicated to hovering over infantry to drop annihilating bombs multiple times during a game, they obviously require the most micromanagement. A well placed carpet bombing can absolutely devastate the enemy frontline, and its machine gun can put out Ratling-Gun levels of DPS on a much more mobile platform.
Important to note that on small unit scale, the gyrobombers bombs are not reduced in damage, so one gyrobomber becomes an army-shredding machine on that unit scale, and putting 2-3 or even more in every army will be an auto-win for the campaign
**'''Skyhammer(ROR)''': Drops cluster bombs, so be aware that the damage-area is greater than the marker shows. Basically the Dwarfs answer to big aoe magic to obliterate chaff and elite units alike.
*'''Gyrocopter:''' Your anti-infantry skirmishers, shooting and bombing out those enemy gunners and artillery that thought themselves safe so far in the back. Also good at harassing the harassers that thought they could run a circle around the slowly pivoting Dawi gun lines.
*'''Gyrocopter (Brimstone Gun):''' Switches from general anti-infantry to majority AP damage to harass and focus down targets with more armor. Generally speaking, superior in almost every way to regular Gyrocopters. Fire damage puts a serious dent in units with regeneration (and Wood Elves) and the lower base damage is neglible when you take AP into consideration.

==Tactics==
===Multiplayer Strategies===
Dwarfs are one of the most unique factions in the game battle wise, with an utter lack of mobility and magick, and focusing everything on tanky infantry that can deal decent damage, and powerful guns and artillery. Unfortunately for them, this uniqueness means that unless you're fighting other Dwarfs, you don't have any balanced match ups against other races. Against some you have a clear, obvious advantage and tend to stomp, and against others, they give you swirlies in the bathroom for your lunch money. This is why most competitive players think they're one of the best counterpick factions as you can avoid your bad match ups and play in a favorable situation. Anyway, here's how you can satisfy the grudge against the other races:

*'''Beastmen''': A rush faction, Beastmen will have a hell of a time against you, if you play your cards right. Their complete lack of armor leaves them quite vulnerable to Thunderer fire on the approach and Bolt Throwers can slice through Minotaurs and Cygors with relative ease. Keep a solid screen of staunch Dwarf Warriors between your ranged units and the enemy and bring (Giant) Slayers to turn the Bestigor and Centigor Herds into ground beef.

*'''Bretonnia''': The peasantry of the Bretonnians can safely be ignored (except Foot Squires, after their buffs they can actually fuck you up pretty good), as they'll struggle to do anything to your heavy armor. Instead, you'll want to focus on bringing down their armored cavalry, particularly the Grail Knights and Grail Guardians leading the charges into you. Trollhammer Irondrakes serve fantastically as a powerful Horse-B-Gone tool and your Giant Slayers can chunk through most of their cavalry so long as they're not the ones receiving the initial charge. Bolt Throwers are, again, a powerful tool to use while the Bretonnian cav is on the approach. Just make sure that you keep your flanks thoroughly secure.

*'''[[Total_War_Warhammer/Tactics/Chaos_Dwarfs| Chaos Dwarfs]]''': Here's the thing about the Dawi-Zharr: their Dwarf units are generally better than yours one-on-one but are far more expensive. You can fill the field with heavily armored and relatively cheap infantry while they have to fill it with greenskin slaves.As a result your army as a whole has better staying power than theirs. Your Thunderers in particular are much cheaper than Fireglaives and have better range than Blunderbusses. Chaos Dwarf artillery can pose a big problem as you are pretty stationary and that's what they love but your cannons get a lot more shots per unit than theirs do and if you play your cards right you can win artillery duels. Watch out for Magma Cannons however, as the burning vortex their shots leave behind can really mess up an artillery crew - focus them down first if possible. Chaos Dwarfs also have lots of big monsters and chariots which will be a problem for you just as they always are. Your best bet is to shoot them down ASAP and if all else fails have a few Slayers in reserve. Gryrobombers can do pretty good against clumped Chaos Dwarf elite infantry and have a place in this matchup.

*'''Daemons of Chaos''': Expect Khorne Furies and a mostly Slaanesh-roster. see Slaanesh's guide below on how to deal with this. The good news is that since daemons of Chaos don't have access to greater daemon lords, you 'might' be able to deal with their hero-class lords. But this is mostly a full pain matchup for you, due to the access to the Slaanesh-roster daemons have.

*'''Chaos Warriors''': For Grungni's sake, keep your distance! Chaos Warriors are as tough as you are and hit harder in melee. Stock up on Thunderers and cannons, and bring some great weapon fighters to finish them off. Slayers can help as long as you're careful to make sure the enemy can't hit back. Keep your eyes out for flanking cavalry and chariots, and pray to the gods you can shoot those heathens before they reach your lines!

*'''Dark Elves''': This is a really tricky matchup for you; Dark Elves are fast and bring absurd AP damage in melee and at a range. Your biggest advantage is your superior range and you'll need to lean on it heavily to stand a chance. Grab cannons, Grudge Throwers, Rangers, and Quarrelers and hope to Grungi you can shoot them down before they get close enough to return the favor.

*'''Dwarfs''': Hopefully you have a general idea on the strengths of this faction, you're playing as them! Anti-Armor, full stop. Organ Guns, take the Skolder Guard and bring some Hammerers to crack open your opponent's can.

*'''Empire''': The Empire can be a tricky one because they're almost as good at artillery as you are while also having good cavalry and skirmishers. You'll need to stock up on gyrobombers to disrupt their flanking cavalry and Slayers to take out their knights. Irondrakes can also work well at deleting any aggressive demigryphs or knights. Beyond that, you should double down on your strengths and keep your artillery safe; the human lines will break before yours do.

*'''Greenskins''': As satisfying as it is to bury an axe in a greenskins skull, you are better off dealing with these guys from a distance. Quarrelers and Rangers are your friends here; quantity is as important as quality when fending off a green tide. Organ Guns and Cannons will be better at dealing with monsters than your Slayers, you don't want to send unarmoured units against Arachnarok Spiders or Rogue Idols. Don't forget your Irondrakes and/or your flame cannons, they can melt down anything from goblins to stone trolls. And keep your flanks protected from chariots and pump-wagons, they can wreak havoc on your lines and just ruin your day.

*'''Grand Cathay''': This is another instance of a faction that does what you do, only a hell of a lot worse. Yeah, you won't have to worry too much about these guys when they show up. Your missile boxes beat their missile boxes, their Cav is subpar and will get eaten by Slayers, and the only AP infantry that they have is Anti Large, which you don't have. Box up, get some cannons and Quarrelers, sit back and enjoy some Bugmans as the Cathayans desperately try to figure out how the fuck they're getting into your backline. Yes they do have their own little airforce, but do you really think Umgi inventions can compete with Dawi Gyrocopters? No. If they bring Sky Junks, send some Gyrocopters after them to pick them down. This faction might get more scary as DLC comes out, but for now this should be an easy win as long as you know what you're doing.

*'''High Elves''': Don't let the War of the Beard fool you, this will be one of your hardest match ups. High Elves have a lot of things that threaten you, but the things to fear the most would be their Chariots, Mages, White Lions and <s>Sisters of Averlorn</s> (they do magic damage so their AP isn't as useful as you think). Seriously, any High Elf player who knows what they're doing is going to spam White Lions and it is going to SUCK. Your best bet is to spam either Gyrocopters or Cannons and spread the field. Force the High Elves to have to either attack your artillery emplacements one at a time, allowing your others to fire freely, or use your air power and artillery to spread them apart and pick off pockets. Hammerers also have a niche in this match up, because they beat White Lions pretty hard one-on-one and with support from guns or chaff, they can go toe to toe with Swordmasters (Though don't count on that). Of course, these plans aren't perfect. There's a 99% chance they will bring Alarielle for Tempest and heals to deal with Gyros and they have plenty of mobility to get at your cannons to give the White Lions time to get in. Sadly, this is one of those match ups where even if you bring the most optimized Anti Elgi list possible, there's still a pretty decent chance you'll lose. Avoid this match up if you can.

*'''Khorne''': It's Khorne, c'mon. Warriors of chaos with somehow even less ranged and even killier once they reach your front lines. Bring plenty of armor-piercing infantry and ranged. If you want to live, protect your artillery from Khorne's furies and calvary.

*'''Kislev''': Kislev's big weakness is that their ranged firepower is also their melee power due to hybrid units, and while this seems great at first glance, they sacrifice both elements to have the other. Your artillery and ranged firepower will dump all over Kislev, your biggest concern are War Bears and Sleds, to which you should apply Slayers. Focus down the wizards and you'll out-brutalize Kislev in good time.

*'''Lizardmen''': Lizardmen are a bit of a mixed bag. On one hand, you can scoff at all the Skinks as they ping impotently off of your armor (unless they're the Red-Crested variety). On the other, Saurus are just as stubborn as you are and will take days to chew through without good AP. Bring some Hammerers to eek out an advantage in the inevitable grindfest you'll end up in. Take advantage of the Lizardmen's dearth of ranged firepower and massacre their forces with Irondrakes and Thunderers, while your Dwarf Warriors hold their front line at bay. You have excellent anti-monster units in the form of your Giant Slayers who absolutely will butcher any big dinosaur thrown into your ranks so long as you have some chaff to help trap and soak the damage the beasties can toss about. Though Skinks will largely prove a minor nuisance at best to a majority of your forces, you will ''definitely'' want to screen your (Giant) Slayers from the Skirmishing variety. Key players to watch out for are going to be the Slann Mage-Priests, Skink Priests and Kroxigors. Slann, especially fire/high Slann and Heavens Skink Priests can wreak utter havoc upon your forces with the myriad of vortex spells they can toss out, like candy from a parade float and they should absolutely be prioritized if you find them on the field. (Sacred) Kroxigors, if fielded, are surprisingly vicious anti-infantry monsters and will bowl over a majority of the infantry they're pointed at. Giant Slayers and Trollhammer Irondrakes serve as a solid counter, but you'll still want to swamp the Kroxigors in chaff to mitigate the damage they deal in turn.

*'''Norsca''': This is an easy fight for you. All of that monster hunting anti-large equipment the Norscans bring is going to fly right over your head as you bury your axes in their unarmoured pecs. Bring plenty of Cannons and Bolt Throwers to shoot down enemy Mammoths and bring some Irondrakes to shoot down anything else. Norscans are usually unarmoured, so you can trade your Thunderers for Quarrelers for the better range. Stick to the basics and you'll do fine.

*'''Nurgle''': Holy shit, a faction that might actually be slower than you! And it seems like you will have a hefty advantage as they don't really have a lot of ways to stop your artillery. The biggest thing you will probably have to worry about is their air force, and Furies and Rotflies will be gunning for that back line. Keep some Slayers near your guns, and get ready to surround them if they try to land. After that you just got to deal with Nurgle's rush of Plaguebearers and Nurglings, and I hope you're ready for nothing to ever die ever because that's likely what is gonna happen when Dawi and Nurgle clash. On the ground, Plague Toads and Pox Riders will likely be your biggest threat with their anti-infantry, but they're also big models, so guns and Slayers should do the trick. Expect a Herald as the commander, and if he's dumb enough to bring a Great Unclean One, laugh and shoot it to pieces. With the new debuffs fire damage does to healing, it might also be wise to break out the Irondrakes and Flame Cannons -- you'll have plenty of time to lob napalm at those shambling hordes of Plaguebearers.
** CoC DLC has brought some changes with access to marked WoC units for Nurgle; the units you will definitely see in this match-up now include Nurgle-marked Chaos Knights, Nurgle-marked Chaos Chariots, Nurgle-marked Chaos Warriors/Chosen with Great Weapons and Nurgle Marauder Horsemen with throwing axes. Knights & Chariots are especially a threat, as they will survive long enough from their speed+armour+Nurgle Mark to get behind your lines and wipe artillery or rear-charge your line infantry. Great weapon Warriors/Chosen, while still vulnerable to your guns when getting to your lines, are both units that have respectable chances of beating your units in the grind with their standard WoC stats, but now plus the Nurgle Mark. The Nurgle Warshrine is a strong support piece for the army, but like a GUO its something Dwarfs can delete so easily that you really should not see it. Generally expect Nurgle armies facing you to have a decent share of Nurgle-marked Mortal units from WoC now, unless your opponent hates themselves.

*'''Ogre Kingdoms''': This match is either gonna be your easiest or your hardest, as this comes down to the skill of you, the Ogre player, and what units you brought to the table. The Ogres have massive charge bonuses, but a lot of your units have charge defense, however unlike other factions, the Ogres will only lose half due to their Ogre Charge trait. The biggest threat the Ogres bring to you is their artillery, and if you leave them be they'll reap a devasting toll on your infantry. The good news is, that with the exception of Leadbelchers, all their artillery are a single model. Have your Cannons and Gyrocopters focus them down and you are good to go, or so you would think. Besides the Gnoblars, Ogres are all monster units, which means two things. One is that your artillery and Slayers will have a field day, but two is that their shockingly fast speed means they're gonna out run you and try to outmaneuver you at every opportunity. Your army should be a good balance of Longbeards, or if you are pinching pennies, Dwarf Warriors, they all have charge defense and can help hold the charging balls of lubber back. This is one of the match up where having a ton of Slayers is a good thing, and stack up on them to defend your back lines and cut the Ogres down to size. Your artillery should consist of two, maybe three Cannons to take out artillery and thin their numbers. Irondrakes with Trollhammer Torpedoes won't be a bad call, but they're on the pricey end. Besides some of their units, bring at least two, or simply one unit of Thunderers at most, because a lot of their stuff is unarmored, your main missile troop should be Quarrelers, they're cheap and will have a good time turning Ogres into pin-cushions and are strong enough to fend off Sabertusks. Your artillerys targeting priority should look something like this: artillery units (Ironblasters first, then Leadbelchers), Stonehorns, and finally, everything else. This should be the only match up where you shouldn't bother bringing Miners with Blasting Charges. The only thing they'll have an effect on is Gnoblars and strictly that, which is a waste of cash and will earn you a grudge for being wasteful. Now get out there and strike out some grudges agaisnt the fat bastards!

*'''Skaven''': This is probably the closest we'll get to a 40k-esque matchup (you know, <strike>aside the irony of neither the [[Squats|Dwarfs]] or Skaven being in that setting</strike> [[Leagues of Votann|The Kin has declared a Grudge against the manling who wrote that]]). Between your guns and artillery and their guns and artillery, most of the damage either of you will be dealing to each other will be done from afar. A majority of the Skaven infantry is quite helpless against your frontline infantry, but you'll have a hell of a time pinning anything down with the Skavens quicker movement speeds. Grudge Throwers are going to be king against most Skaven infantry builds, while Bolt Throwers or Cannons should be fielded to snipe any Warp-Lighting Cannons, Plagueclaw Catapults or Hellpit Abominations they have downfield. Warplock Jezzails will be a priority target to focus fire down, as are Warpfire Throwers and Poison Wind Globadiers, should they start getting too close. Aside utilizing their missile units against them, Skaven have absolutely no aerial presence, meaning your Gyrocopters will have virtually free reign to gun down rats at will.

*'''Slaanesh''': A bad day for you all around. It's become apparent, that if you're unlucky enough to run into Slaanesh, you're going to want to forego ranged firepower almost entirely, Miners with Blasting Charges and Ironbreakers will trade efficiently, maybe a safety pick of Thunderers to deal with a Keeper Of Secrets, but AP on everything, Furies, Spawn and chariots will just pulverize your formations in one of the most one-sided setups in the game right now.

*'''Tomb Kings''': The good news is that Tomb Kings don't like fire, and you have fire aplenty. Brimstone Gun-equipped Gyrocoptors are your fastest fire-delivery system, but Irondrakes and Flame Cannons are useful as well. The bad news is, that you don't like chariots, and they have chariots aplenty. Use every trick you can to soften up the chariots before they hit your lines; but it's unlikely you'll be able to stop them all. Grab some Giant Slayers to finish off the ones that survive your barrage and hope it's enough to keep them down. Tomb Kings infantry is no match for you, so you should build your army against their monsters and chariots.

*'''Tzeentch''': Ooh, here is somebody that's going to hate you. Tzeentch units are squishy and their ranged units only have middling range and are better for kiting. He also has no artillery other than Soul Grinders, few big monsters outside of Lords of Change, and relies heavily on spamming spells to activate their army abilities. Bring a Runelord or Thorek on an Anvil of Doom and laugh as their casters explode. Otherwise, pound them into dust with artillery, as they have few answers to an army with better range than them. Just guard the back line against Furies and Doom Knights and don't bother with air units, they'll get shot down in short order.

*'''Vampire Coast''': The most common Vampire Coast strategy is to bunker up with a large number of cheap ranged units and heavy artillery. If that sounds familiar, it's only because it's the same thing you like to do, you're just better at it. Bring plenty of Cannons and some Slayers to deal with the enemy monsters (hint: kill the Necrofex Colossi first). Once the big monsters have been dealt with, the pirates are basically just an inferior version of you, clumps of Quarrelers and Thunderers are plenty to take down the Zombies. And remember not to bunker up too tightly; you may have magic resistance but Winds of Death will still hurt.

*'''Vampire Counts''': Virtually nothing that makes up the rank and file of the Vampire Counts will pose a significant threat to you. Skeletons and Zombies will only serve to slow down your already plodding advance and only deal any meaningful "damage" to you simply by sponging your limited ranged firepower meant for something else. The only standard units that you'll find yourself at a significant disadvantage against will be the Cairn and Hex Wraiths, given your general lack of magical damage. You'll want to engage them with missile attacks for maximum effect and make sure that you are braced for their charges. The main thing you should be focused on taking down will be the Lords and Heroes leading the army; without them, the undead hordes will quickly fall apart (literally). They also pose the single biggest threat to everything you have, as their Lore of Death casters can delete swathes of your army with a single well placed cast if you are positioned carelessly.

*'''Wood Elves''': Wood Elves are an extremely annoying foe who are fundamentally the exact opposite of you. Their infantry can run circles around yours and they can deal frightening amounts of damage against their intended targets, but you'll snap their twiggy spines if you whip 'em with your beards. In general, you're going to be engaged in a very tedious game of "keep away", where the Wood Elves are going to be dancing just outside of your reach while their Glade Guard and Waywatchers pepper you with AP arrows and occasionally test your flanks for weaknesses via Wild Rider/Great Stag Knight cycle charges. Fortunately, you do have a couple tools the elves don't: Artillery. Grudge Throwers excel against WE infantry and can discourage them from trying to camp too far away, while Bolt Throwers and Flame Cannons will make mince-meat of the cavalry/Forest Spirits that may try to break through your lines. Speaking of Forest Spirits, Irondrakes will ''incinerate'' them. Slayers also help against the bigger tree spirits in theory, but the ranged power the Wood Elves bring make them a dicey proposition. As far as their melee infantry options are concerned, the only ones that majorly threaten you are the Bladesingers; their anti-armor magical attacks will scythe through your armor will jaw-dropping speed. Use Thunderers to soften them up on the charge then use Slayers to cut them down swiftly.

===Domination===
General Tier Rank: '''F'''

You are just SO FUCKING SLOW. You opponent is going to get to the point first, no question about it and most armies have plenty of ways to roadblock you in order to stop you from getting on them. While few factions will be able to contest you in a head on charge for the midpoint, once they start going for the side points you will have no way to out contest them. Important to note that there are some maps that you won't get completely dumpstered automatically. The more choke points that are on a map, the better it is for you because then the enemy will be more forced to try to take you head on instead of just avoid direct contact with you in an attempt to cap more points. However, even then there's no way you can outmaneuver your enemy unless they fall asleep at their computer out of boredom. Don't play Dwarfs in Domination until they get some major buffs, a DLC, or rework that will help them move around the map better.

However if you still decide to stay committed to playing dwarfs, the general tip is seize two caps at least and have a squadron of gyrocopters and bombers to harass the foe, ironbreakers are king here, jam them on a point and laugh as your opponent struggles to get them off, rangers and miners are key here as they are the only units with vanguard deployment (this includes the ROR ironbreakers) to delay the foe by brawling with them as your slower units get into position or to reinforce your troops if needed, slayers are necessary here as besides gyrocopters, their the fastest thing you got, bring along 3, 4 if needed, to both delete cav or monsters too big for their britches and do aforementioned delaying tactics, for artillery, on smaller maps, organ guns and flame cannons will be an excellent infantry/cavalry begone tool for clearing out points that are infested with enemy troops, as per the norm, bring a cannon to deal with enemy artillery and snipe monsters regardless of the map size, on longer maps, the grudge-thrower will be a much better alternative for clearing out points, but organ guns and flame cannons are a good deterrent for defending points, as they’ll delete blobs, just make sure there safe from enemy cav and flyers, however the one weakness as listed above, is your slowness, you need to be smart if you want to consistently win domination as dwarfs, assume a box formation as units in said shape, turn about faster and thus let them react to threats flanking around or move to different points faster if it’s necessary (keep in mind, it does not increase movement speed, it just hastens how fast they turn), while it is vulnerable to artillery fire, your cannons should already be firing at said artillery, follow this guide somewhat well and proceed to wipe every smug grin off with an axe, show every YouTuber good or otherwise how wrong they were as you strike out grudges and get vengeance for every domination tier list that put you in F tier!

===Campaign Strategies===
*'''Karaz-A-Karak''': Karaz-A-Karak starts out with a solid base economy and a protected position, with your flanks covered by minor dwarven factions and only one Greenskin faction as your initial enemy. However, that start is deceivingly simple at first; once Grimgor and Queek get going, your position will become increasingly precarious if you're not careful. Your biggest weakness is easily your very slow growth, as the Greenskins and Skaven often will have higher tier units much sooner than you do. Making the jump from Tier 3 to 4 as soon as you can is your top priority. Once your scary lategame units arrive, you can start to dominate the Southlands and expand in any direction you damn please.
**'''Pick Gronbrimdal (Mortal Empires only)''': There is no reason to ever pick Thorgim over Grombrindal as your starting LL. Grombrindal comes with a much better selection of starting units (Gyrocopters, Irondrakes and Thunderers) and his blue skill tree might be one of the most blatantly overpowered things in the game on its own, as Grombrindals variants of the perks not just affect his army, but your entire faction. Thorgrim can be recruited later down the line regardless.
**'''Don't get bogged down''': The initial 50 turns of any campaign might just be called "get ready for Grimgor". While you can expand quickly at the start, it is ill advised (and very tempting) to stray too far from your Capital and end up with your armies battering against your starting enemies while Grimgor happily carves a path straight towards Karaz-A-Karak. Losing Karaz-A-Karak becomes a win condition in this case; if you can successfully defend it, the Greenskins are finished, if you lose it, you can restart a new campaign.

'

*Clan Angrund''' In immortal empires Belegar's difficulty level has been severely reduced, on turn one as soon as you take your first settlement you can full-confederate Karak Izor instantly. After that it's the usual hop and skip to Karak-Eight-Peaks, however with it in Skarsnik's hands now, it's significantly easier to take as Skarsnik doesn't start with a full 20 stack army unlike the 'Crooked Moon Mutineers' from Warhammer 2.
[[Category:Total Warhammer]] {{Total War Warhammer Tactics}}

Total War Warhammer/Tactics/Dwarfs

2023-06-12T16:33:15Z

2A02:1810:4E2C:A900:DC0E:597F:F427:CBEB: /* Units */

{{Topquote|Kazukhan-kazakit-ha! (Look out, the Dwarfs are on the warpath!)|Game battle chant for Dwarfs, if you think about it, it should be look <s>down</s> THAT'S A GRUDGE!}}
This is the tactics page for the Total War: Warhammer version of The Dwarfs.

==Why play Dwarfs?==
*Because you want to sit and watch as your enemies are blasted away while coming towards you.
*Cause you're under 5'5 and want '''vengeance''' for all the short jokes.
*You don't want to do too much micro, so an army without much in the way of mobility and cavalry doesn't bother you as much.
*You enjoy having infantry that won't die after being slapped by a wet noodle.
*Slay everything without a beard!!
*FLAMETHROWERS!!!

===Pros===
*'''Durability''': You are a tank faction. Most of your units are categorized with high armour, melee defense and leadership. Even your tier one and chaff are very tanky compared to counterparts from other factions. This is further supplemented by the innate magic resist many of your units have, which ''slightly'' compensates for your otherwise complete lack of magic. Additionally, with their naturally high leadership, dwarfs do not usually break unless hopelessly outnumbered or if you screw up massively by getting cavalry charged in the rear. Frankly, your units will hold out forever.
**Your magic resistance got nerfed in the third game to ''only'' resist magical spells. Still useful, but now units with magic attacks, I.E Daemons, are going to be way better at cracking you open.
*'''Range''': Guns, guns and more guns! Dwarfs have some of the best blackpowder units in the entire game. Thunderers and Cannons can lay a whooping on anything they are firing on, and their artillery isn't anything to sneer at. Even their non-AP range units are very good for their price, and it's not hard for them to earn their points back as long as they are defended.
*'''If they get close, Nut 'em!''': As if being being one of the best factions at shooting was not enough, their missile units can also hold their own in close quarters better than most.
*'''Airforce''': Gyrocopters with their anti large can get you control over the air, and their ability to kite monsters into oblivion is a good skill to have. Even Gyrobombers have a niche for their blob killing capabilities after recent buffs.
*'''Runes''': Where other races rely on the fickle Winds of Magic, you have your reliable runes. Runes supply surprisingly good buffs and debuffs that can help your army out, making them a great way to make sure your infantry stays in the fight a bit longer. The fact that they aren't limited by a power reserve also means that they'll remain a viable option well into the latter stages of a fight, where other factions might begin to tap out of their mystical power.
*'''Anti-large''': You laugh when the enemy brings big monsters. With all your AP missiles, Anti Large artillery and slayers, you have the one of the easiest times killing monsters out of any faction in the game.
*'''Strong Economy''': It's campaign specific but yeah, it turns out the species who's renowned for being the best at making shit is also one of the best at making money. The resource building chains go up to level IV instead of stopping at level III, you can mass produce Dwarf Beer anywhere. Putting together Doomstacks of Top Tier Dawi troops is easier.
*'''Good for Beginners''': Everyone was just starting once, if you are new to Warhammer Total War or just Total War in general the Dawi are (ironically enough) forgiving. Something like the Wood Elves is fragile and has a limited margin for error, Dwarfs on the other hand have more of a fudge factor in most match ups. Not to say that it's easy mode playing dwarfs, but the likelihood of things going pear shaped in a second is lower.

===Cons===
*'''Lack of Mobility''': With no Cav, monsters and slow infantry, Dwarfs are the least mobile faction in the game. You will spend the majority of the game standing still.
*'''Lack of Magic''': Though your most recent rework makes your runes a damn good alternative, you don't really have magic. This can pose a problem when you face similarly physically durable armies in battle and lack a reliable, magical alternative for damage. Additionally, though you defensively have a 25% resistance to the arcane, many large vortex spells will still sting quite a bit and your complete lack of magical healing means it'll be hard to bounce back from the damage you do take.
*'''Chariots''': Chariots are the bane of a Dwarf players existence. They don't have any real way to lock them down and, as you'd expect, AP anti infantry can really kill what the Dwarfs want to do on the battlefield. Due to the rework to how bracing and knock down works, this isn’t as bad as before, but chariots can still be a problem
*'''Predictability''': Most veteran players know what's going to happen when Dwarfs are picked. They are going to go for a cheap, numerous and sturdy front line and a lot of guns and artillery. This means that Dwarfs are easy to plan for as they only have one real viable tactic. Building an army around fighting Dwarfs is something players from all races know how to do.
*'''Lack of Good Lord Options''': Do you like the Runelord or Thorek? No? Well you better start because in multiplayer they're your only viable options. Grombrindal is an ok duelist but honestly Dwarf lords in general kind of suck. With no mounts and no way to stick to their targets it's hard for them to get anything done. This problem got better with the Twisted and the Twilight due to the changes to knockdown effects, but sticking to targets will still be hard
*'''Hard campaign''': With all the changes to the factions around them, the Dawi have fallen on some pretty hard times. The lifetime of WH2 dotted the landscape around Karaz-A-Karak alone with a huge number of guaranteed enemies that you will have to look out for, with your most reliable allies in the Empire being very far away. The other subfactions don't fare much better and your slow growth seriously hurts your ability to expand, especially when compared with your most dominant enemies, the Greenskins of the Badlands and Clan Mors further down the road.
*'''Bad in Domination''': Turns out your stubby little legs makes it really hard for you to capture objectives. Due to your lack of mobility you can't effectively capture points since other factions can just out race you to them and get more units on them. As such, you're widely considered the weakest faction in Domination.
*'''DLC''': A con for everyone, but fortunately you get off easier than many others. Unfortunately, a couple of your best units, namely Runelords and Rangers, are in fact locked behind DLC and if you want to really use your Dwarfs to the fullest, you'll need to pay the toll.

==Universal Traits==

*'''The Great Book of Grudges''': The fact that the sacred Dammaz Kron went unmentioned on this pages for so long merits an entry on its own. The Book of Grudges documents every slight committed against your faction, including legendary grudges that you start out with. Whenever something bad happens, i.e. you lose a settlement, get raided or a hostile faction repeatedly trespasses on your turf without you allowing it, it merits an entry in the book. These entries can (and will) accumulate over time, and depending on how much your Dorfs disliked the transgression, will vary in severity, which fills up a meter that gives you some penalties and some bonusses. High severity from unresolved Grudges gives you minor public order and research speed penalties, but it also gives all of your armies a charge bonus (since the Dwarfs are so pissed off) and increases the chance of Slayers and Giant Slayers popping up in your Regiments of Renown pool, where they can then be recruited instantly into your armies. Resolving Grudges and Legendary Grudges (such as retaking Karak Eight Peaks as Belegar Ironhammer) also earns you powerful bonusses (money, Oathgold, small buffs for the entire faction ) and special Runes.
*'''Oathgold''': The secondary resource of the Dwarfs. Practically identical to the Mortuary Cult of the Tomb Kings, with the key difference being that the Dwarfs can make much more stuff with Oathgold and that the stuff is much more abundant. Oathgold is earned through resolving Grudges, doing missions and quests, Gold Mines and some special buildings such as the Brightstone Mine in Mount Gunbad. Oathgold, combined with trade goods, can be used to create items for your Lords and Heroes, which makes it downright trivial to kit out every single character on the map with some special gizmos to make them really powerful. Oathgold can also be used to make Character and Banner Runes, the former can be applied as equipment to individual characters (with up to 3 individual runes at maximum), the latter functions like Banners that you can give units to give them special bonusses and abilities.
*'''Expert Charge Defense''': Barring Slayers, every single one of your units has Expert Charge Defense, which nullifies charge bonusses and also the momentum of units charging into your staunch line of angry Dwarfs.
*'''Magic Resistance''': Every Dwarf has a built in 25% Magic Resist (Spell Resist in WH3). Consult the main page for WHFB Dwarfs as to why.

==Legendary Lords and Subfactions==
*'''Thorgrim Grudgebearer:''' The high king himself, and the only large non-war machine unit in your roster, as he is carried on a massive throne sled by some burly dwarfs, Thorgrim isn't huge on offence, better than say mid-tier combat lords, but he's mostly just a hard to kill brick of leadership. Dwarfs in range of him just become slightly harder to break, which isn't saying much given their default morale, and he's not easily sniped. This results in him being kind of underwhelming, you know he's not going to die like a bitch, but you also know that he's not exactly going to recoup even a quarter of his cost. Is kind of safe in campaign play for beginners, but Grombrindal is overall superior. - Pass.
*'''Ungrim Ironfist:''' The Slayer King, bane of anything taller than six feet, Ungrim is the opposite of Thorgrim; all offence, with low defence. Ungrim is actually pretty good in terms of being a hero-killer and monster-hunter, he's not going to solo Tyrion or Kroq-Gar, and don't even think of monster lords like Kholek or monstrous mounts such as a Tomb King on a war sphinx, without a unit to bog them down. The problem with Ungrim is that while he can throw hands and live up to his title, he eats a lot of damage for a dwarf, or just in general for a combat lord, he's easy to snipe with massed missiles if caught in the open, and while he can butcher most things sent his way, he'll only be able to do this once or twice in a battle before he's at serious risk of dying. Don't let that 120 armour & unbreakable make you think he's a tank, Ungrim's Melee Defence is quite low for a combat lord, and that low dwarf speed means he can by kited to death. Thorgrim lacks the damage to recoup his cost, Ungrim lacks the defence to recoup his costs. If playing with an ally that has access to Lore of Life he can be kept alive, but you're asking a lot of resources to support the Slayer King. - Pass.
*'''Grombrindal:''' THE WHITE DWARF, Grombrindal doesn't bring anything really special to the table, he's a decent duelist, although lacking the balls-to-the-wall offence of Ungrim Ironfist, Grombrinal is nowhere near as risky for a combat lord. The flashbomb ability can lockdown mobile heroes and give the white dwarf a few easy hits. Doesn't quite bring much for the rest of the army, but is the best legendary lord for cost-benefit tradeoffs. He can fight, he can survive, and he can make the entire army Unbreakable with a reusable map-wide buff. - Niche but competitive in that niche. In Campaign, he is easily the best LL the Dwarfs offer. His blue skill tree affects ''your entire faction'' and the four blessings you can choose every 20 turns (10 after picking a specific skill) are all very powerful, a whopping +25% Research Rate is no joke, as are +10 Melee Attack and Defense for every unit in Grombrindals army.
*'''Belegar Ironhammer:'''(DLC) Belegar is really just a wall, he's harder to kill than Thorgrim as they have comparable stats, but he has a silver shield for 55% missile resistance. That's all. Just an insanely hard to kill lord, sure his offence isn't terrible, being better than Thorgrim's on base stats and a nice buff can be popped to go higher. But honestly you're paying a lot for a lord that won't die, and generally speaking Dwarfs in Total War: Warhammer aren't a faction that is centred around their generals or heroes. No real wizards to throw high-impact spell effects, no mobile heroes that can exploit small gaps to flank units or hunt down supporting pieces like buffers, wizards or artillery crews. The only upshot to taking Belegar's subfaction in multiplayer is getting access the ancestor heroes who are damned hard to kill, but are also the only dwarf units that are scared of magic damage, which can sort of be a mind-games thing because the default assumption to seeing Clan Angrund picked is that ancestor heroes are on the field, so grab some magic damage to delete them, but then seeing that there are no ghost dwarfs means that the magic damage is actually a big waste considering all dwarfs have 25% Magic Resistance. - Pass.
*'''Thorek Ironbrow:'''(FLC): With the rework comes a new LL and Thorek serves this role, being the latest (and most likely last) new contender in the Lustrian Thunderdome in the Vortex Campaign, and starting at the southernmost tip of the map in Karak Zorn on Mortal Empires. He serves as a supercharged Runelord with access to a unique mount that messes quite a bit with enemy spellcasting and improved Runic Magic on his own part. In the campaign, his legendary conservativeness translates into bonusses for "traditional" Dwarfen ranged units like Quarrelers and Grudge Throwers. Not to worry though, since he starts with a Rune of Burning that makes the Catapult projectiles [[Awesome|FUCKING EXPLODE]] and dramatically increases the combat value of Quarrelers in his own Army quite significantly (arguably making them even better than Thunderers). His campaign goal revolves around finding several lost Dwarfen artifacts, which can then be used to craft powerful buffs for your whole faction. [[Derp|He also can make enemy casters explode.]] - Best Multiplayer lord pick.

==Units==
===Generic Lords===
*'''Dwarf Lord:''' No, just no, he suffers from the same issue that the Legendary Lords suffer from, being too slow. But wait there's more, the generic Lord is easier to kill in combat, provides less army support, and does less damage. He's not even the cheapest option to help save costs. I mean he has a shield, but its only bronze. Unless you've got some kind of bet riding on a battle and there's a specific stipulation that you cannot use any other Lord, screw the money because he's too crap. That said compared to generic foot Lords in other factions he's quite difficult to kill, which is more advice for fighting Dwarf Lords in campaign really. PASS!
*'''Runelord:''' (DLC) Yes, yes yes. The one competitive General in multiplayer, the Runelord is just a walking bubble of passive buffs that make your low tier units good, and your good infantry units even better. Has good active abilities, like Master Rune of Oath & Steel which gives +30 armour to all dwarfs in range, or the Rune of Speed which adds 45% speed and 24 melee attack to all dwarfs in range. This is the Lord pick that supports the dwarf army, and don't think he's some kind of wizard that dies when someone looks at him funny, while the melee defence is low at 40, the Runelord has the same 120 armour as the other Lords, plus up to 35% missile resistance, sharing 20% of that with nearby allies. Slapping him on an Anvil of Doom gives a special ability that causes enemy casters to automatically miscast for minor damage when near him. TL;DR fucks magic, gets buffs. - Good if you want Thorek but a bit cheaper.

===Legendary Heroes (Clan Angrund Only)===
All [[Clan Angrund]] has such a strong relationship with their ancestors, they come back as ghosts. Like all ghosts, they have a 75% physical resistance instead of magic resistance, with magic attacks, Unbreakable, but no armor and less health than normal. They have Fear and Terror making them good at chasing the enemy off. They themselves are weak to magic attacks, but who takes that much offense magic against Dwarfs anyway?

*'''King Lunn Ironhammer:''' is one of the two ghost Thanes, being the offensive one, with slightly more Melee attack than a normal Thane.
*'''Halkenhaf Stonebeard:''' the other ghost Thane, being the most defensive of the par with significantly lower melee attack but a very high defense of 65 and silver shield, letting him minge with enemies for a protracted time to proc terror routs.
*'''Throni Ironbrow:''' Mostlickly to take as he is a Runesmith, so someone that needs protection while also being in the front lines.
*'''Dramar Hammerfist:''' the ghost engineer so paying extra for a harder to kill gun lines buffer and better at chasing away those that try to disrupt them.

===Heroes===
*'''Master Engineer:''' Basically a must if you're running more than 2 artillery pieces, buffs artillery, has a decent sniper rifle of his own, not great in a fight with anything beyond hound packs and light cavalry, so don't expect him to be an effective guard for the cannons he's buffing. However if there is another unit nearby casting Entrenchment right before they rout will make the unit hold the line and fight even after being routed. On campaign they also boost your army's mobility. Aaaaaand the Dwarf Rework happened, buffing him even further with the ability of the Vampirate Gunnery Wight to restore lost ammo to artillery pieces for up to five times. Just too good to miss out on if you're bringing a bunch of cannons (and who doesn't, honestly).
*'''Runesmith:''' Basically a squishier version of the Runelord, has many of the same buffs, both passive and active. With the Dwarf rework, these guys have gone from being merely decent to amazing. While utilizing a rune puts every other rune on a shared cooldown, this only applies per caster; having multiple Runesmiths allows you to stack multiple buffs simultaneously or across multiple units without having to wait out the full 60 second global cooldown. They might not necessarily be an auto-include persay, but having one or two of these guys in your army is strongly recommended.
*'''Thane:''' While they still suffer from being slow, Thanes can be used more aggressively than Legendary Lords. Kit them out with the Rune of Slowness to gimp enemy mobility, or give them the Ironbeard's Ring and coordinate with a source of fire damage: Flame Cannons, Dragonback Slayers, Warriors of Dragonfire Pass, basic Irondrakes, or Brimstone Gyrocopters, all of these will deal serious damage to units inside the debuff aura.

===Infantry===
*'''Miners''': The closest thing to cannon fodder in the Dwarf Roster, miners are cheap AP units. Also give "speed" and breadth to Dawi list by vanguarding.
*'''Dwarf Warriors''': Did you know that a unit of Dwarf Warriors costs 475 gold but can hold against 3 units of Empire Swordsmen, costing 400 gold each, for just over 2 minutes and racking up roughly 90-100 kills before dying/breaking? Dwarf Warriors aren't great, just good, and are very much just a shield wall frontline. Dwarf Warriors are very cost-effective starting units. They will trade positively against most infantry that are tier 1-3 excluding units with high AP values or anti-infantry buffs. Dwarf Warriors aren't the same as elite heavy infantry however, they will break in time, if rear charged, if attacked by great weapon units, if hit with leadership debuffs, or if attacked by characters. This is a unit that buys time for a unit in the second line to get in position to assist, do not assume you can just deploy them as a single line and have artillery sit safely behind them.
**'''Warriors of Dragonfire Pass'''(ROR): Slightly better warriors that deal fire damage in combat, not a guaranteed pick most of the time, but good against any faction that is vulnerable to fire, consider pairing with a Thane carrying Ironbeard's Ring to boost damage.
*'''Dwarf Warriors (Great Weapons)''': You know how Dwarf Warriors can hold frontlines for a time but need a second line unit to assist them, this is cheapest of the second line units. Regular warriors have shields, 40 Melee Defence, and charge defence against large units, Warriors with Great Weapons don't have those defences, they get armour piercing damage which is the kind of offence needed to make up for the vanilla warriors' shortcomings. Don't try and use them as a frontline unit, and replace them when you can with other melee infantry.
*'''Longbeards''': Warriors +1 really, they buff the leadership of other units (it's the generic Encourage passive so no stacking with Lords), so consider mixing them with warriors. Cost-wise your mostly paying for better Melee Defence, better Leadership, the leadership aura, and Immune to Psychology compared to vanilla Warriors. A common question is which is better for cost, Longbeards or Warriors, but outside of fighting undead armies that have tons of fear/terror effects, the answer to the question is; use both. While the differences between the two units are obvious in comparison, to the player on the other side of the battlefield it doesn't matter much because a Dwarf line is still a solid formation that is hard to break. Longbeards work good in the wings to buff leadership in the flanks, and having warrior units means you can save gold for more missile units and artillery.
*'''Longbeards (Great Weapons)''': While the difference between shield Warriors and shield Longbeards isn't much, the great weapon variant favours the Longbeards, which come with Charge Defense and Armor-Piercing (but no target specialization). In MP, where every gold coin counts, if all you need is cheap AP, take the Warriors, but if you want something tankier and able to encourage your dwarfs to hold out a bit longer, take these guys.
**'''The Grumbling Guard'''(ROR): Not too bad, stat wise its a bit more armour & melee attack, 10 more leadership, and 13 more Melee Defence, which puts them at a whopping 51 Melee Defence. You don't get any improved damage output with these guys, instead you get an ability that replenishes 9% of vigour for them and nearby allies. This may not sound like much, but fatigue debuffs are crippling for units, and Dwarfs rely on grinding things out so even a small vigour buff to some units is good even if it just moves them from exhausted to very tired. But wait, this ability has infinite uses and a low cooldown so spam it away. While Hammerers do the same job but better, the Grumbling Guard are fantastic for keeping Ironbreakers in better condition than their enemies.
*'''Slayers''': Slayers are kind of weird. They're unbreakable, quick (for a Dwarf), hit hard, and do a lot of damage with no consideration to survivability. This means that they can seriously fuck up higher-tier units but on the same time are vulnerable to cannon fodder. It does not matter if you're a crappy goblin with a crappy spear, it's getting through a Slayer's hide as much as a Chosen's Daemonforged Axe. When using Slayers, hold them back so that other units, especially ones with charge defense, take the brunt of the charge before moving the slayers to counter-attack, and while it might cost you the charge bonus, having them attack through the buffer unit really improves the lifespan of your slayers (Probably much to their chagrin). Note that if you ever leave them in the open, missile units just have to imagine shooting them to wipe the unit, which is an expensive mistake. Also a definite must take against vampire counts and Tomb Kings with all their fear effects but do not ever think about using them against Vampire Pirates because they will get shot to pieces before any fear/terror units get close for the unbreakable to matter. Also, leave them at home against Wood Elves, or if you have fore-knowledge that your opponent likes horse-archer tactics.
*With the Dwarf rework that dropped together with Thorek Ironbrow, they went from terrible in Single Player to a pretty good choice for the early game, since you can now recruit them anywhere as long as your grudge meter is up. It also makes unlimited Slayer Doomstacks lead by Ungrim Ironfist a terrifying sight to behold.
**'''Dragonback Slayers'''(ROR): Slayers with better MA & MD, and they get physical resistance on top of the shield defense. The real value comes with their passive that activates in melee, it gives them fire damage, fire resistance, and applies slow debuff and the flammable trait for weakness to fire (doesn't stack if the enemy already has the flammable trait, but will stack with other effects of a different name that reduce fire resistance). The physical resist, slow debuff and the combo of fire damage and flammable debuff makes this unit a generally better pick over vanilla slayers, note that they do not get the fire resistance outside of combat so getting hit by flaming missiles outside of combat will hurt, the lore of fire spells are still subject to dwarf magic resistance though.
*'''Giant Slayers''': These are just super slayers, too costly to run a lot of. They will instantly blend light cavalry units like Marauder Horsemen or Ellyrian Reavers that dare to charge them, not that you should be using them to counter these units, it's just funny to see happen. Giant Slayers are basically Ungrim Ironfist as many Dwarfs instead of one. What they don't kill will be pretty close to death. Cannon fodder might counter slayers, but Giant Slayers dish out enough melee damage that you only need to worry about elite infantry and high mass units charging them. More vulnerable to shooting as they don't get the missile defense that Slayers get, these guys are expensive but do the job. Not recommended as a staple unit in army builds due to their cost, but good to pick if you're against monster or cavalry heavy armies.
*'''Hammerers''': Your well-armored, AP Damage dealing elite Dwarfs, not the same tank as a Longbeard but will deal serious AP damage. They've been reworked in the latest game, giving them substantially more health and magical(!) damage, meaning they're your best chance against Daemons and Treekin. **Still the same weaknesses as before, though: they're a Hammer (heh) in an Army of Anvils, so they'll mostly be pushing their way through your infantry
**Peak Gate Guard(ROR): The ultimate anti-armor unit, they go through heavily armored units like swordsmen through skavenslaves and then let other Dawi also participate in the fun.

===Ranged Infantry===
*'''Thunderers''': Like Empire handgunners, but you don't need to babysit them as much. A very useful unit even in the lategame that won't break the bank.
*'''Irondrakes:''' Where the fun begins. Ridiculously high damage output, solidly armoured. Need positioning to work right, but will absolutely demolish anything that you point them at. Their flamethrowers are considered artillery so they cannot be blocked by shields and inflict morale penalty upon anything they hit. They are surprisingly strong in melee against infantry if not deployed in a thin line because the back row can use their flamethrowers at point-blank, but not against cavalry as they'll pierce till the back row.
**'''The Skolder Guard'''(ROR): Replaces Lava for Steam to be an anti-armor unit. Much tougher than an Irondrakes with Physical resistance which is nice to have when the enemy gets a sneaky charge. They will multch full-plate units quickly given they have an even faster reload speed but watch out as you will also burn through their limited ammunition just as quickly. Against enemies with less armor you're better off using regular Irondrakes.
*'''Irondrakes (Trollhammer Torpedo)''': the Anti large version of the Irondrakes, having rocket launchers instead of Flamers. Often times Irondrakes can just melt through the armor of most things they are pointed at, sometimes they are Cavalry or monsters that have enough armor to shrug off that current of magma. Unlike regular Irondrakes they can shoot over units and obstacles. Don't be fooled by how their torpedoes explode, they don't do splash damage and should only attack infantry if you don't have anything bigger to shoot.

===Combined Infantry===
*'''Quarrellers''': Boring but practical. Like dwarf warriors, they're able to trade shots with the tier 1 ranged units of pretty much every other faction and winning because they come with shields on top of their dwarf armor. They also come with armor piercing, which makes them a budget option for shooting stuff like chaos warriors. However, they do less DPS per gold spent than similar units like empire crossbowmen and darkshards.
**As mentioned above, Thorek brings out the best in these guys, keeping them very relevant even to the late game. The shield variant is best used against missile-heavy factions like Wood Elves, but does nothing against Artillery.
*'''Quarrellers (Great Weapons)''': Similar to Quarrelers, except they give up shields in exchange for armor-piercing melee weapons. Won't win much in close combat, but they'll take down more enemies before they're overwhelmed, particularly against squishy units like harpies.
**Thorek buffs them to an insane degree to the point that when combined with all the relevant campaign bonuses, Quarrelers will become the core of your army. They're still not a frontline since they only have so many models in a unit, but 6-10 of these guys can outright delete anything that gives your Longbeards and Ironbreakers a hard time (Mammoths, stonehorns, even Rogue Idols). They also autoresolve very well, taking more losses than the shielded variant, but will take less losses than your frontline infantry.
*'''Miners (Blasting Charges)''': take that Cheap miner, then give them a single volley for bomb-throwing. Each model only gets one bomb, so make it count. Turn off ''Fire at Will'' and select the targets manually. A well-thrown Blasting Charge will decimate most charging infantry.
**'''Ekrund Miners'''(ROR): A regiment that Gets 3 Blasting Charges instead of 1. Depending on how well you managed them, that's paying less gold then recruiting 3 Blasting Charge Miners which matter very much in the gold restricted multiplayer.
*'''Ironbreakers''': The fact that Ironbreakers are one of the toughest units in the game would make them a key part of a Dawi late game army. Add to that blasting charges and you have something which can stomp most other infantry into the ground, blowing away a quarter of their hitpoints and ruining their charge before finishing off the survivors. Their only downside is that their damage in hand to hand is not that great, but that's what thunderers, slayers and artillery is for. NEVER let artillery, including artillery towers, target them. They're so slow they're target practice and they're no.1 priority as dwarfs don't have anything bigger.
**'''Norgrimlings Ironbreakers''':(ROR) Even better Ironbreakers, With bigger model size (so more bombes and unit health), a faster throwing arm, Vanguard, and Immune to Psychology. Overall a more powerful unit that can holds back the hords for longer while dealing more casualties.
*'''Rangers''': Sneaky Dwarf Quarrellers getting Vanguard and Stalk for a surprise Dwarf ambush. They have better speed to help with positioning and catching enemies at least when compared to other Dawi. They're armour is pretty good for most armies, but among Dwarfs they're on the lower end of defenses.
*'''Rangers (Great Weapons)''': Ranger equivalent of Quarrellers(Great Weapons) with one key difference; unlike the great weapon Quarreler the Rangers give up their crossbows entirely in favor of shorter ranged, higher AP throwing axes. Surprise AP flanking is a thing any Dwarf list could ask for. Keep in mind that each dwarf only carries 8 axes, so they'll run out much quicker than other rangers. Once they run out of throwing axes they become a decent anti-armour skirmishing unit, although their low defense means they need to chose their opponents carefully.
**'''Ulthar's Raiders'''(ROR) a unit your should be more careful with than just normal Rangers with Great Weapons, as they get the [[Witch Hunter]]'s ability to Mark a unit for death. You do get a fair amount of range despite having only infantry speed, being able to strip an enemy of a lot of their protection they had against ranged weapons. Good take if your using a Focus fire strategy, assuming your can keep the Raiders safe while making back their cost.
*'''Bugman's Rangers''' Surprisingly not a ROR. Improved Rangers, having the regenerative and drunkenness properties of Bugman's liquid courage. they are better at fighting off harassers while their improved shooting and HP recovery help them win archer fights. These are to Rangers as Longbeards are to Warriors: a straight upgrade assuming you can afford it. In MP, they can last longer without support and work best if you're good at micro. If not, you're probably better just leaving them at home in favor of more units of regular rangers.

===Cavalry===
Does not exist. See Slayers, Rangers and Air Units if you want something fast, you beardling.

===Artillery===
*'''Bolt Thrower:''' Your cheaper anti-large Artillery. More accurate and shoots faster than a cannon, but outclassed by them in splash and penetration power. Best used to take out elite cavalry and monsters in the early campaign.
*'''Grudge Thrower''': Your first artillery unit. Fills a role like an Empire Mortar as a long-range anti-infantry weapon giving it has the largest radius of splash damage on impact.
**'''Gob-Lobber (Grudge Thrower)(ROR)''': Like the Grudge Thrower, but better. Also has live Goblins bolted to the projectiles. Causes morale penalties to targets, which stacks with the penalty for being hit by artillery.
*'''Cannon:''' Your classic artillery. Slow to fire but harder to dodge, best used as an Anti-large weapon while also killing models in high armor units, through can have difficulties hitting if the enemy zigzags too much like most Artillery units.
*'''Organ Gun:''' An effective horse begone tool, with good armor piercing and a ton of cannon balls flying everywhere, cavalry will quickly and efficiently die off in droves as your foe rages, if there’s no cav to shoot, then this thing is good for pulping infantry and can do a decent job at eliminating chariots.
*'''Flame Cannon''' Jack-of-all-trades artillery. Great area damage to deal with blobs of infantry and while it doesn't cause AP damage, its base damage is high enough that it doesn't matter. Funny enough, its stats make it much better at breaking towers and walls than cannons.

===Air Units===
The closest thing to "cavalry". Flying Bombers. Fill a role as the fast-moving guns to shoot at enemy flanks and drop anti-infantry bombs. The rotor blades can also dish out a good amount of melee damage, but having almost no melee defense makes them relatively fragile despite having high armor. They are often safe in the air, but keep them away from other flyers and AP missiles. Despite this, they are absurdly fast having speed in the 200s to run from most problems (only Pegasus Knights or Hawk Riders could catch them without nets or debuffs). To use effectively will require some mico.

*'''Gyrobomber:''' Your dedicated bomber which sacrifices other aspects to be the best at that. As a single mobile unit dedicated to hovering over infantry to drop annihilating bombs multiple times during a game, they obviously require the most micromanagement. A well placed carpet bombing can absolutely devastate the enemy frontline, and its machine gun can put out Ratling-Gun levels of DPS on a much more mobile platform.
Important to note that on small unit scale, the gyrobombers bombs are not reduced in damage, so one gyrobomber becomes an army-shredding machine on that unit scale, and putting 2-3 or even more in every army will be an auto-win for the campaign
**'''Skyhammer(ROR)''': Drops cluster bombs, so be aware that the damage-area is greater than the marker shows. Basically the Dwarfs answer to big aoe magic to obliterate chaff and elite units alike.
*'''Gyrocopter:''' Your anti-infantry skirmishers, shooting and bombing out those enemy gunners and artillery that thought themselves safe so far in the back. Also good at harassing the harassers that thought they could run a circle around the slowly pivoting Dawi gun lines.
*'''Gyrocopter (Brimstone Gun):''' Switches from general anti-infantry to majority AP damage to harass and focus down targets with more armor. Generally speaking, superior in almost every way to regular Gyrocopters. Fire damage puts a serious dent in units with regeneration (and Wood Elves) and the lower base damage is neglible when you take AP into consideration.

==Tactics==
===Multiplayer Strategies===
Dwarfs are one of the most unique factions in the game battle wise, with an utter lack of mobility and magick, and focusing everything on tanky infantry that can deal decent damage, and powerful guns and artillery. Unfortunately for them, this uniqueness means that unless you're fighting other Dwarfs, you don't have any balanced match ups against other races. Against some you have a clear, obvious advantage and tend to stomp, and against others, they give you swirlies in the bathroom for your lunch money. This is why most competitive players think they're one of the best counterpick factions as you can avoid your bad match ups and play in a favorable situation. Anyway, here's how you can satisfy the grudge against the other races:

*'''Beastmen''': A rush faction, Beastmen will have a hell of a time against you, if you play your cards right. Their complete lack of armor leaves them quite vulnerable to Thunderer fire on the approach and Bolt Throwers can slice through Minotaurs and Cygors with relative ease. Keep a solid screen of staunch Dwarf Warriors between your ranged units and the enemy and bring (Giant) Slayers to turn the Bestigor and Centigor Herds into ground beef.

*'''Bretonnia''': The peasantry of the Bretonnians can safely be ignored (except Foot Squires, after their buffs they can actually fuck you up pretty good), as they'll struggle to do anything to your heavy armor. Instead, you'll want to focus on bringing down their armored cavalry, particularly the Grail Knights and Grail Guardians leading the charges into you. Trollhammer Irondrakes serve fantastically as a powerful Horse-B-Gone tool and your Giant Slayers can chunk through most of their cavalry so long as they're not the ones receiving the initial charge. Bolt Throwers are, again, a powerful tool to use while the Bretonnian cav is on the approach. Just make sure that you keep your flanks thoroughly secure.

*'''[[Total_War_Warhammer/Tactics/Chaos_Dwarfs| Chaos Dwarfs]]''': Here's the thing about the Dawi-Zharr: their Dwarf units are generally better than yours one-on-one but are far more expensive. You can fill the field with heavily armored and relatively cheap infantry while they have to fill it with greenskin slaves.As a result your army as a whole has better staying power than theirs. Your Thunderers in particular are much cheaper than Fireglaives and have better range than Blunderbusses. Chaos Dwarf artillery can pose a big problem as you are pretty stationary and that's what they love but your cannons get a lot more shots per unit than theirs do and if you play your cards right you can win artillery duels. Watch out for Magma Cannons however, as the burning vortex their shots leave behind can really mess up an artillery crew - focus them down first if possible. Chaos Dwarfs also have lots of big monsters and chariots which will be a problem for you just as they always are. Your best bet is to shoot them down ASAP and if all else fails have a few Slayers in reserve. Gryrobombers can do pretty good against clumped Chaos Dwarf elite infantry and have a place in this matchup.

*'''Daemons of Chaos''': Expect Khorne Furies and a mostly Slaanesh-roster. see Slaanesh's guide below on how to deal with this. The good news is that since daemons of Chaos don't have access to greater daemon lords, you 'might' be able to deal with their hero-class lords. But this is mostly a full pain matchup for you, due to the access to the Slaanesh-roster daemons have.

*'''Chaos Warriors''': For Grungni's sake, keep your distance! Chaos Warriors are as tough as you are and hit harder in melee. Stock up on Thunderers and cannons, and bring some great weapon fighters to finish them off. Slayers can help as long as you're careful to make sure the enemy can't hit back. Keep your eyes out for flanking cavalry and chariots, and pray to the gods you can shoot those heathens before they reach your lines!

*'''Dark Elves''': This is a really tricky matchup for you; Dark Elves are fast and bring absurd AP damage in melee and at a range. Your biggest advantage is your superior range and you'll need to lean on it heavily to stand a chance. Grab cannons, Grudge Throwers, Rangers, and Quarrelers and hope to Grungi you can shoot them down before they get close enough to return the favor.

*'''Dwarfs''': Hopefully you have a general idea on the strengths of this faction, you're playing as them! Anti-Armor, full stop. Organ Guns, take the Skolder Guard and bring some Hammerers to crack open your opponent's can.

*'''Empire''': The Empire can be a tricky one because they're almost as good at artillery as you are while also having good cavalry and skirmishers. You'll need to stock up on gyrobombers to disrupt their flanking cavalry and Slayers to take out their knights. Irondrakes can also work well at deleting any aggressive demigryphs or knights. Beyond that, you should double down on your strengths and keep your artillery safe; the human lines will break before yours do.

*'''Greenskins''': As satisfying as it is to bury an axe in a greenskins skull, you are better off dealing with these guys from a distance. Quarrelers and Rangers are your friends here; quantity is as important as quality when fending off a green tide. Organ Guns and Cannons will be better at dealing with monsters than your Slayers, you don't want to send unarmoured units against Arachnarok Spiders or Rogue Idols. Don't forget your Irondrakes and/or your flame cannons, they can melt down anything from goblins to stone trolls. And keep your flanks protected from chariots and pump-wagons, they can wreak havoc on your lines and just ruin your day.

*'''Grand Cathay''': This is another instance of a faction that does what you do, only a hell of a lot worse. Yeah, you won't have to worry too much about these guys when they show up. Your missile boxes beat their missile boxes, their Cav is subpar and will get eaten by Slayers, and the only AP infantry that they have is Anti Large, which you don't have. Box up, get some cannons and Quarrelers, sit back and enjoy some Bugmans as the Cathayans desperately try to figure out how the fuck they're getting into your backline. Yes they do have their own little airforce, but do you really think Umgi inventions can compete with Dawi Gyrocopters? No. If they bring Sky Junks, send some Gyrocopters after them to pick them down. This faction might get more scary as DLC comes out, but for now this should be an easy win as long as you know what you're doing.

*'''High Elves''': Don't let the War of the Beard fool you, this will be one of your hardest match ups. High Elves have a lot of things that threaten you, but the things to fear the most would be their Chariots, Mages, White Lions and <s>Sisters of Averlorn</s> (they do magic damage so their AP isn't as useful as you think). Seriously, any High Elf player who knows what they're doing is going to spam White Lions and it is going to SUCK. Your best bet is to spam either Gyrocopters or Cannons and spread the field. Force the High Elves to have to either attack your artillery emplacements one at a time, allowing your others to fire freely, or use your air power and artillery to spread them apart and pick off pockets. Hammerers also have a niche in this match up, because they beat White Lions pretty hard one-on-one and with support from guns or chaff, they can go toe to toe with Swordmasters (Though don't count on that). Of course, these plans aren't perfect. There's a 99% chance they will bring Alarielle for Tempest and heals to deal with Gyros and they have plenty of mobility to get at your cannons to give the White Lions time to get in. Sadly, this is one of those match ups where even if you bring the most optimized Anti Elgi list possible, there's still a pretty decent chance you'll lose. Avoid this match up if you can.

*'''Khorne''': It's Khorne, c'mon. Warriors of chaos with somehow even less ranged and even killier once they reach your front lines. Bring plenty of armor-piercing infantry and ranged. If you want to live, protect your artillery from Khorne's furies and calvary.

*'''Kislev''': Kislev's big weakness is that their ranged firepower is also their melee power due to hybrid units, and while this seems great at first glance, they sacrifice both elements to have the other. Your artillery and ranged firepower will dump all over Kislev, your biggest concern are War Bears and Sleds, to which you should apply Slayers. Focus down the wizards and you'll out-brutalize Kislev in good time.

*'''Lizardmen''': Lizardmen are a bit of a mixed bag. On one hand, you can scoff at all the Skinks as they ping impotently off of your armor (unless they're the Red-Crested variety). On the other, Saurus are just as stubborn as you are and will take days to chew through without good AP. Bring some Hammerers to eek out an advantage in the inevitable grindfest you'll end up in. Take advantage of the Lizardmen's dearth of ranged firepower and massacre their forces with Irondrakes and Thunderers, while your Dwarf Warriors hold their front line at bay. You have excellent anti-monster units in the form of your Giant Slayers who absolutely will butcher any big dinosaur thrown into your ranks so long as you have some chaff to help trap and soak the damage the beasties can toss about. Though Skinks will largely prove a minor nuisance at best to a majority of your forces, you will ''definitely'' want to screen your (Giant) Slayers from the Skirmishing variety. Key players to watch out for are going to be the Slann Mage-Priests, Skink Priests and Kroxigors. Slann, especially fire/high Slann and Heavens Skink Priests can wreak utter havoc upon your forces with the myriad of vortex spells they can toss out, like candy from a parade float and they should absolutely be prioritized if you find them on the field. (Sacred) Kroxigors, if fielded, are surprisingly vicious anti-infantry monsters and will bowl over a majority of the infantry they're pointed at. Giant Slayers and Trollhammer Irondrakes serve as a solid counter, but you'll still want to swamp the Kroxigors in chaff to mitigate the damage they deal in turn.

*'''Norsca''': This is an easy fight for you. All of that monster hunting anti-large equipment the Norscans bring is going to fly right over your head as you bury your axes in their unarmoured pecs. Bring plenty of Cannons and Bolt Throwers to shoot down enemy Mammoths and bring some Irondrakes to shoot down anything else. Norscans are usually unarmoured, so you can trade your Thunderers for Quarrelers for the better range. Stick to the basics and you'll do fine.

*'''Nurgle''': Holy shit, a faction that might actually be slower than you! And it seems like you will have a hefty advantage as they don't really have a lot of ways to stop your artillery. The biggest thing you will probably have to worry about is their air force, and Furies and Rotflies will be gunning for that back line. Keep some Slayers near your guns, and get ready to surround them if they try to land. After that you just got to deal with Nurgle's rush of Plaguebearers and Nurglings, and I hope you're ready for nothing to ever die ever because that's likely what is gonna happen when Dawi and Nurgle clash. On the ground, Plague Toads and Pox Riders will likely be your biggest threat with their anti-infantry, but they're also big models, so guns and Slayers should do the trick. Expect a Herald as the commander, and if he's dumb enough to bring a Great Unclean One, laugh and shoot it to pieces. With the new debuffs fire damage does to healing, it might also be wise to break out the Irondrakes and Flame Cannons -- you'll have plenty of time to lob napalm at those shambling hordes of Plaguebearers.
** CoC DLC has brought some changes with access to marked WoC units for Nurgle; the units you will definitely see in this match-up now include Nurgle-marked Chaos Knights, Nurgle-marked Chaos Chariots, Nurgle-marked Chaos Warriors/Chosen with Great Weapons and Nurgle Marauder Horsemen with throwing axes. Knights & Chariots are especially a threat, as they will survive long enough from their speed+armour+Nurgle Mark to get behind your lines and wipe artillery or rear-charge your line infantry. Great weapon Warriors/Chosen, while still vulnerable to your guns when getting to your lines, are both units that have respectable chances of beating your units in the grind with their standard WoC stats, but now plus the Nurgle Mark. The Nurgle Warshrine is a strong support piece for the army, but like a GUO its something Dwarfs can delete so easily that you really should not see it. Generally expect Nurgle armies facing you to have a decent share of Nurgle-marked Mortal units from WoC now, unless your opponent hates themselves.

*'''Ogre Kingdoms''': This match is either gonna be your easiest or your hardest, as this comes down to the skill of you, the Ogre player, and what units you brought to the table. The Ogres have massive charge bonuses, but a lot of your units have charge defense, however unlike other factions, the Ogres will only lose half due to their Ogre Charge trait. The biggest threat the Ogres bring to you is their artillery, and if you leave them be they'll reap a devasting toll on your infantry. The good news is, that with the exception of Leadbelchers, all their artillery are a single model. Have your Cannons and Gyrocopters focus them down and you are good to go, or so you would think. Besides the Gnoblars, Ogres are all monster units, which means two things. One is that your artillery and Slayers will have a field day, but two is that their shockingly fast speed means they're gonna out run you and try to outmaneuver you at every opportunity. Your army should be a good balance of Longbeards, or if you are pinching pennies, Dwarf Warriors, they all have charge defense and can help hold the charging balls of lubber back. This is one of the match up where having a ton of Slayers is a good thing, and stack up on them to defend your back lines and cut the Ogres down to size. Your artillery should consist of two, maybe three Cannons to take out artillery and thin their numbers. Irondrakes with Trollhammer Torpedoes won't be a bad call, but they're on the pricey end. Besides some of their units, bring at least two, or simply one unit of Thunderers at most, because a lot of their stuff is unarmored, your main missile troop should be Quarrelers, they're cheap and will have a good time turning Ogres into pin-cushions and are strong enough to fend off Sabertusks. Your artillerys targeting priority should look something like this: artillery units (Ironblasters first, then Leadbelchers), Stonehorns, and finally, everything else. This should be the only match up where you shouldn't bother bringing Miners with Blasting Charges. The only thing they'll have an effect on is Gnoblars and strictly that, which is a waste of cash and will earn you a grudge for being wasteful. Now get out there and strike out some grudges agaisnt the fat bastards!

*'''Skaven''': This is probably the closest we'll get to a 40k-esque matchup (you know, <strike>aside the irony of neither the [[Squats|Dwarfs]] or Skaven being in that setting</strike> [[Leagues of Votann|The Kin has declared a Grudge against the manling who wrote that]]). Between your guns and artillery and their guns and artillery, most of the damage either of you will be dealing to each other will be done from afar. A majority of the Skaven infantry is quite helpless against your frontline infantry, but you'll have a hell of a time pinning anything down with the Skavens quicker movement speeds. Grudge Throwers are going to be king against most Skaven infantry builds, while Bolt Throwers or Cannons should be fielded to snipe any Warp-Lighting Cannons, Plagueclaw Catapults or Hellpit Abominations they have downfield. Warplock Jezzails will be a priority target to focus fire down, as are Warpfire Throwers and Poison Wind Globadiers, should they start getting too close. Aside utilizing their missile units against them, Skaven have absolutely no aerial presence, meaning your Gyrocopters will have virtually free reign to gun down rats at will.

*'''Slaanesh''': A bad day for you all around. It's become apparent, that if you're unlucky enough to run into Slaanesh, you're going to want to forego ranged firepower almost entirely, Miners with Blasting Charges and Ironbreakers will trade efficiently, maybe a safety pick of Thunderers to deal with a Keeper Of Secrets, but AP on everything, Furies, Spawn and chariots will just pulverize your formations in one of the most one-sided setups in the game right now.

*'''Tomb Kings''': The good news is that Tomb Kings don't like fire, and you have fire aplenty. Brimstone Gun-equipped Gyrocoptors are your fastest fire-delivery system, but Irondrakes and Flame Cannons are useful as well. The bad news is, that you don't like chariots, and they have chariots aplenty. Use every trick you can to soften up the chariots before they hit your lines; but it's unlikely you'll be able to stop them all. Grab some Giant Slayers to finish off the ones that survive your barrage and hope it's enough to keep them down. Tomb Kings infantry is no match for you, so you should build your army against their monsters and chariots.

*'''Tzeentch''': Ooh, here is somebody that's going to hate you. Tzeentch units are squishy and their ranged units only have middling range and are better for kiting. He also has no artillery other than Soul Grinders, few big monsters outside of Lords of Change, and relies heavily on spamming spells to activate their army abilities. Bring a Runelord or Thorek on an Anvil of Doom and laugh as their casters explode. Otherwise, pound them into dust with artillery, as they have few answers to an army with better range than them. Just guard the back line against Furies and Doom Knights and don't bother with air units, they'll get shot down in short order.

*'''Vampire Coast''': The most common Vampire Coast strategy is to bunker up with a large number of cheap ranged units and heavy artillery. If that sounds familiar, it's only because it's the same thing you like to do, you're just better at it. Bring plenty of Cannons and some Slayers to deal with the enemy monsters (hint: kill the Necrofex Colossi first). Once the big monsters have been dealt with, the pirates are basically just an inferior version of you, clumps of Quarrelers and Thunderers are plenty to take down the Zombies. And remember not to bunker up too tightly; you may have magic resistance but Winds of Death will still hurt.

*'''Vampire Counts''': Virtually nothing that makes up the rank and file of the Vampire Counts will pose a significant threat to you. Skeletons and Zombies will only serve to slow down your already plodding advance and only deal any meaningful "damage" to you simply by sponging your limited ranged firepower meant for something else. The only standard units that you'll find yourself at a significant disadvantage against will be the Cairn and Hex Wraiths, given your general lack of magical damage. You'll want to engage them with missile attacks for maximum effect and make sure that you are braced for their charges. The main thing you should be focused on taking down will be the Lords and Heroes leading the army; without them, the undead hordes will quickly fall apart (literally). They also pose the single biggest threat to everything you have, as their Lore of Death casters can delete swathes of your army with a single well placed cast if you are positioned carelessly.

*'''Wood Elves''': Wood Elves are an extremely annoying foe who are fundamentally the exact opposite of you. Their infantry can run circles around yours and they can deal frightening amounts of damage against their intended targets, but you'll snap their twiggy spines if you whip 'em with your beards. In general, you're going to be engaged in a very tedious game of "keep away", where the Wood Elves are going to be dancing just outside of your reach while their Glade Guard and Waywatchers pepper you with AP arrows and occasionally test your flanks for weaknesses via Wild Rider/Great Stag Knight cycle charges. Fortunately, you do have a couple tools the elves don't: Artillery. Grudge Throwers excel against WE infantry and can discourage them from trying to camp too far away, while Bolt Throwers and Flame Cannons will make mince-meat of the cavalry/Forest Spirits that may try to break through your lines. Speaking of Forest Spirits, Irondrakes will ''incinerate'' them. Slayers also help against the bigger tree spirits in theory, but the ranged power the Wood Elves bring make them a dicey proposition. As far as their melee infantry options are concerned, the only ones that majorly threaten you are the Bladesingers; their anti-armor magical attacks will scythe through your armor will jaw-dropping speed. Use Thunderers to soften them up on the charge then use Slayers to cut them down swiftly.

===Domination===
General Tier Rank: '''F'''

You are just SO FUCKING SLOW. You opponent is going to get to the point first, no question about it and most armies have plenty of ways to roadblock you in order to stop you from getting on them. While few factions will be able to contest you in a head on charge for the midpoint, once they start going for the side points you will have no way to out contest them. Important to note that there are some maps that you won't get completely dumpstered automatically. The more choke points that are on a map, the better it is for you because then the enemy will be more forced to try to take you head on instead of just avoid direct contact with you in an attempt to cap more points. However, even then there's no way you can outmaneuver your enemy unless they fall asleep at their computer out of boredom. Don't play Dwarfs in Domination until they get some major buffs, a DLC, or rework that will help them move around the map better.

However if you still decide to stay committed to playing dwarfs, the general tip is seize two caps at least and have a squadron of gyrocopters and bombers to harass the foe, ironbreakers are king here, jam them on a point and laugh as your opponent struggles to get them off, rangers and miners are key here as they are the only units with vanguard deployment (this includes the ROR ironbreakers) to delay the foe by brawling with them as your slower units get into position or to reinforce your troops if needed, slayers are necessary here as besides gyrocopters, their the fastest thing you got, bring along 3, 4 if needed, to both delete cav or monsters too big for their britches and do aforementioned delaying tactics, for artillery, on smaller maps, organ guns and flame cannons will be an excellent infantry/cavalry begone tool for clearing out points that are infested with enemy troops, as per the norm, bring a cannon to deal with enemy artillery and snipe monsters regardless of the map size, on longer maps, the grudge-thrower will be a much better alternative for clearing out points, but organ guns and flame cannons are a good deterrent for defending points, as they’ll delete blobs, just make sure there safe from enemy cav and flyers, however the one weakness as listed above, is your slowness, you need to be smart if you want to consistently win domination as dwarfs, assume a box formation as units in said shape, turn about faster and thus let them react to threats flanking around or move to different points faster if it’s necessary (keep in mind, it does not increase movement speed, it just hastens how fast they turn), while it is vulnerable to artillery fire, your cannons should already be firing at said artillery, follow this guide somewhat well and proceed to wipe every smug grin off with an axe, show every YouTuber good or otherwise how wrong they were as you strike out grudges and get vengeance for every domination tier list that put you in F tier!

===Campaign Strategies===
*'''Karaz-A-Karak''': Karaz-A-Karak starts out with a solid base economy and a protected position, with your flanks covered by minor dwarven factions and only one Greenskin faction as your initial enemy. However, that start is deceivingly simple at first; once Grimgor and Queek get going, your position will become increasingly precarious if you're not careful. Your biggest weakness is easily your very slow growth, as the Greenskins and Skaven often will have higher tier units much sooner than you do. Making the jump from Tier 3 to 4 as soon as you can is your top priority. Once your scary lategame units arrive, you can start to dominate the Southlands and expand in any direction you damn please.
**'''Pick Gronbrimdal (Mortal Empires only)''': There is no reason to ever pick Thorgim over Grombrindal as your starting LL. Grombrindal comes with a much better selection of starting units (Gyrocopters, Irondrakes and Thunderers) and his blue skill tree might be one of the most blatantly overpowered things in the game on its own, as Grombrindals variants of the perks not just affect his army, but your entire faction. Thorgrim can be recruited later down the line regardless.
**'''Don't get bogged down''': The initial 50 turns of any campaign might just be called "get ready for Grimgor". While you can expand quickly at the start, it is ill advised (and very tempting) to stray too far from your Capital and end up with your armies battering against your starting enemies while Grimgor happily carves a path straight towards Karaz-A-Karak. Losing Karaz-A-Karak becomes a win condition in this case; if you can successfully defend it, the Greenskins are finished, if you lose it, you can restart a new campaign.

'

*Clan Angrund''' In immortal empires Belegar's difficulty level has been severely reduced, on turn one as soon as you take your first settlement you can full-confederate Karak Izor instantly. After that it's the usual hop and skip to Karak-Eight-Peaks, however with it in Skarsnik's hands now, it's significantly easier to take as Skarsnik doesn't start with a full 20 stack army unlike the 'Crooked Moon Mutineers' from Warhammer 2.
[[Category:Total Warhammer]] {{Total War Warhammer Tactics}}

Total War Warhammer/Tactics/Dwarfs

2023-06-12T16:29:14Z

2A02:1810:4E2C:A900:DC0E:597F:F427:CBEB: /* Universal Traits */

{{Topquote|Kazukhan-kazakit-ha! (Look out, the Dwarfs are on the warpath!)|Game battle chant for Dwarfs, if you think about it, it should be look <s>down</s> THAT'S A GRUDGE!}}
This is the tactics page for the Total War: Warhammer version of The Dwarfs.

==Why play Dwarfs?==
*Because you want to sit and watch as your enemies are blasted away while coming towards you.
*Cause you're under 5'5 and want '''vengeance''' for all the short jokes.
*You don't want to do too much micro, so an army without much in the way of mobility and cavalry doesn't bother you as much.
*You enjoy having infantry that won't die after being slapped by a wet noodle.
*Slay everything without a beard!!
*FLAMETHROWERS!!!

===Pros===
*'''Durability''': You are a tank faction. Most of your units are categorized with high armour, melee defense and leadership. Even your tier one and chaff are very tanky compared to counterparts from other factions. This is further supplemented by the innate magic resist many of your units have, which ''slightly'' compensates for your otherwise complete lack of magic. Additionally, with their naturally high leadership, dwarfs do not usually break unless hopelessly outnumbered or if you screw up massively by getting cavalry charged in the rear. Frankly, your units will hold out forever.
**Your magic resistance got nerfed in the third game to ''only'' resist magical spells. Still useful, but now units with magic attacks, I.E Daemons, are going to be way better at cracking you open.
*'''Range''': Guns, guns and more guns! Dwarfs have some of the best blackpowder units in the entire game. Thunderers and Cannons can lay a whooping on anything they are firing on, and their artillery isn't anything to sneer at. Even their non-AP range units are very good for their price, and it's not hard for them to earn their points back as long as they are defended.
*'''If they get close, Nut 'em!''': As if being being one of the best factions at shooting was not enough, their missile units can also hold their own in close quarters better than most.
*'''Airforce''': Gyrocopters with their anti large can get you control over the air, and their ability to kite monsters into oblivion is a good skill to have. Even Gyrobombers have a niche for their blob killing capabilities after recent buffs.
*'''Runes''': Where other races rely on the fickle Winds of Magic, you have your reliable runes. Runes supply surprisingly good buffs and debuffs that can help your army out, making them a great way to make sure your infantry stays in the fight a bit longer. The fact that they aren't limited by a power reserve also means that they'll remain a viable option well into the latter stages of a fight, where other factions might begin to tap out of their mystical power.
*'''Anti-large''': You laugh when the enemy brings big monsters. With all your AP missiles, Anti Large artillery and slayers, you have the one of the easiest times killing monsters out of any faction in the game.
*'''Strong Economy''': It's campaign specific but yeah, it turns out the species who's renowned for being the best at making shit is also one of the best at making money. The resource building chains go up to level IV instead of stopping at level III, you can mass produce Dwarf Beer anywhere. Putting together Doomstacks of Top Tier Dawi troops is easier.
*'''Good for Beginners''': Everyone was just starting once, if you are new to Warhammer Total War or just Total War in general the Dawi are (ironically enough) forgiving. Something like the Wood Elves is fragile and has a limited margin for error, Dwarfs on the other hand have more of a fudge factor in most match ups. Not to say that it's easy mode playing dwarfs, but the likelihood of things going pear shaped in a second is lower.

===Cons===
*'''Lack of Mobility''': With no Cav, monsters and slow infantry, Dwarfs are the least mobile faction in the game. You will spend the majority of the game standing still.
*'''Lack of Magic''': Though your most recent rework makes your runes a damn good alternative, you don't really have magic. This can pose a problem when you face similarly physically durable armies in battle and lack a reliable, magical alternative for damage. Additionally, though you defensively have a 25% resistance to the arcane, many large vortex spells will still sting quite a bit and your complete lack of magical healing means it'll be hard to bounce back from the damage you do take.
*'''Chariots''': Chariots are the bane of a Dwarf players existence. They don't have any real way to lock them down and, as you'd expect, AP anti infantry can really kill what the Dwarfs want to do on the battlefield. Due to the rework to how bracing and knock down works, this isn’t as bad as before, but chariots can still be a problem
*'''Predictability''': Most veteran players know what's going to happen when Dwarfs are picked. They are going to go for a cheap, numerous and sturdy front line and a lot of guns and artillery. This means that Dwarfs are easy to plan for as they only have one real viable tactic. Building an army around fighting Dwarfs is something players from all races know how to do.
*'''Lack of Good Lord Options''': Do you like the Runelord or Thorek? No? Well you better start because in multiplayer they're your only viable options. Grombrindal is an ok duelist but honestly Dwarf lords in general kind of suck. With no mounts and no way to stick to their targets it's hard for them to get anything done. This problem got better with the Twisted and the Twilight due to the changes to knockdown effects, but sticking to targets will still be hard
*'''Hard campaign''': With all the changes to the factions around them, the Dawi have fallen on some pretty hard times. The lifetime of WH2 dotted the landscape around Karaz-A-Karak alone with a huge number of guaranteed enemies that you will have to look out for, with your most reliable allies in the Empire being very far away. The other subfactions don't fare much better and your slow growth seriously hurts your ability to expand, especially when compared with your most dominant enemies, the Greenskins of the Badlands and Clan Mors further down the road.
*'''Bad in Domination''': Turns out your stubby little legs makes it really hard for you to capture objectives. Due to your lack of mobility you can't effectively capture points since other factions can just out race you to them and get more units on them. As such, you're widely considered the weakest faction in Domination.
*'''DLC''': A con for everyone, but fortunately you get off easier than many others. Unfortunately, a couple of your best units, namely Runelords and Rangers, are in fact locked behind DLC and if you want to really use your Dwarfs to the fullest, you'll need to pay the toll.

==Universal Traits==

*'''The Great Book of Grudges''': The fact that the sacred Dammaz Kron went unmentioned on this pages for so long merits an entry on its own. The Book of Grudges documents every slight committed against your faction, including legendary grudges that you start out with. Whenever something bad happens, i.e. you lose a settlement, get raided or a hostile faction repeatedly trespasses on your turf without you allowing it, it merits an entry in the book. These entries can (and will) accumulate over time, and depending on how much your Dorfs disliked the transgression, will vary in severity, which fills up a meter that gives you some penalties and some bonusses. High severity from unresolved Grudges gives you minor public order and research speed penalties, but it also gives all of your armies a charge bonus (since the Dwarfs are so pissed off) and increases the chance of Slayers and Giant Slayers popping up in your Regiments of Renown pool, where they can then be recruited instantly into your armies. Resolving Grudges and Legendary Grudges (such as retaking Karak Eight Peaks as Belegar Ironhammer) also earns you powerful bonusses (money, Oathgold, small buffs for the entire faction ) and special Runes.
*'''Oathgold''': The secondary resource of the Dwarfs. Practically identical to the Mortuary Cult of the Tomb Kings, with the key difference being that the Dwarfs can make much more stuff with Oathgold and that the stuff is much more abundant. Oathgold is earned through resolving Grudges, doing missions and quests, Gold Mines and some special buildings such as the Brightstone Mine in Mount Gunbad. Oathgold, combined with trade goods, can be used to create items for your Lords and Heroes, which makes it downright trivial to kit out every single character on the map with some special gizmos to make them really powerful. Oathgold can also be used to make Character and Banner Runes, the former can be applied as equipment to individual characters (with up to 3 individual runes at maximum), the latter functions like Banners that you can give units to give them special bonusses and abilities.
*'''Expert Charge Defense''': Barring Slayers, every single one of your units has Expert Charge Defense, which nullifies charge bonusses and also the momentum of units charging into your staunch line of angry Dwarfs.
*'''Magic Resistance''': Every Dwarf has a built in 25% Magic Resist (Spell Resist in WH3). Consult the main page for WHFB Dwarfs as to why.

==Legendary Lords and Subfactions==
*'''Thorgrim Grudgebearer:''' The high king himself, and the only large non-war machine unit in your roster, as he is carried on a massive throne sled by some burly dwarfs, Thorgrim isn't huge on offence, better than say mid-tier combat lords, but he's mostly just a hard to kill brick of leadership. Dwarfs in range of him just become slightly harder to break, which isn't saying much given their default morale, and he's not easily sniped. This results in him being kind of underwhelming, you know he's not going to die like a bitch, but you also know that he's not exactly going to recoup even a quarter of his cost. Is kind of safe in campaign play for beginners, but Grombrindal is overall superior. - Pass.
*'''Ungrim Ironfist:''' The Slayer King, bane of anything taller than six feet, Ungrim is the opposite of Thorgrim; all offence, with low defence. Ungrim is actually pretty good in terms of being a hero-killer and monster-hunter, he's not going to solo Tyrion or Kroq-Gar, and don't even think of monster lords like Kholek or monstrous mounts such as a Tomb King on a war sphinx, without a unit to bog them down. The problem with Ungrim is that while he can throw hands and live up to his title, he eats a lot of damage for a dwarf, or just in general for a combat lord, he's easy to snipe with massed missiles if caught in the open, and while he can butcher most things sent his way, he'll only be able to do this once or twice in a battle before he's at serious risk of dying. Don't let that 120 armour & unbreakable make you think he's a tank, Ungrim's Melee Defence is quite low for a combat lord, and that low dwarf speed means he can by kited to death. Thorgrim lacks the damage to recoup his cost, Ungrim lacks the defence to recoup his costs. If playing with an ally that has access to Lore of Life he can be kept alive, but you're asking a lot of resources to support the Slayer King. - Pass.
*'''Grombrindal:''' THE WHITE DWARF, Grombrindal doesn't bring anything really special to the table, he's a decent duelist, although lacking the balls-to-the-wall offence of Ungrim Ironfist, Grombrinal is nowhere near as risky for a combat lord. The flashbomb ability can lockdown mobile heroes and give the white dwarf a few easy hits. Doesn't quite bring much for the rest of the army, but is the best legendary lord for cost-benefit tradeoffs. He can fight, he can survive, and he can make the entire army Unbreakable with a reusable map-wide buff. - Niche but competitive in that niche. In Campaign, he is easily the best LL the Dwarfs offer. His blue skill tree affects ''your entire faction'' and the four blessings you can choose every 20 turns (10 after picking a specific skill) are all very powerful, a whopping +25% Research Rate is no joke, as are +10 Melee Attack and Defense for every unit in Grombrindals army.
*'''Belegar Ironhammer:'''(DLC) Belegar is really just a wall, he's harder to kill than Thorgrim as they have comparable stats, but he has a silver shield for 55% missile resistance. That's all. Just an insanely hard to kill lord, sure his offence isn't terrible, being better than Thorgrim's on base stats and a nice buff can be popped to go higher. But honestly you're paying a lot for a lord that won't die, and generally speaking Dwarfs in Total War: Warhammer aren't a faction that is centred around their generals or heroes. No real wizards to throw high-impact spell effects, no mobile heroes that can exploit small gaps to flank units or hunt down supporting pieces like buffers, wizards or artillery crews. The only upshot to taking Belegar's subfaction in multiplayer is getting access the ancestor heroes who are damned hard to kill, but are also the only dwarf units that are scared of magic damage, which can sort of be a mind-games thing because the default assumption to seeing Clan Angrund picked is that ancestor heroes are on the field, so grab some magic damage to delete them, but then seeing that there are no ghost dwarfs means that the magic damage is actually a big waste considering all dwarfs have 25% Magic Resistance. - Pass.
*'''Thorek Ironbrow:'''(FLC): With the rework comes a new LL and Thorek serves this role, being the latest (and most likely last) new contender in the Lustrian Thunderdome in the Vortex Campaign, and starting at the southernmost tip of the map in Karak Zorn on Mortal Empires. He serves as a supercharged Runelord with access to a unique mount that messes quite a bit with enemy spellcasting and improved Runic Magic on his own part. In the campaign, his legendary conservativeness translates into bonusses for "traditional" Dwarfen ranged units like Quarrelers and Grudge Throwers. Not to worry though, since he starts with a Rune of Burning that makes the Catapult projectiles [[Awesome|FUCKING EXPLODE]] and dramatically increases the combat value of Quarrelers in his own Army quite significantly (arguably making them even better than Thunderers). His campaign goal revolves around finding several lost Dwarfen artifacts, which can then be used to craft powerful buffs for your whole faction. [[Derp|He also can make enemy casters explode.]] - Best Multiplayer lord pick.

==Units==
===Generic Lords===
*'''Dwarf Lord:''' No, just no, he suffers from the same issue that the legendary lords suffer from, being too slow. But wait there's more, the generic lord is easier to kill in combat, provides less army support, and does less damage. He's not even the cheapest option to help save costs. I mean he has a shield, but its only bronze. Unless you've got some kind of bet riding on a battle and there's a specific stipulation that you cannot use any other lord, screw the money because he's too crap. That said compared to generic foot lords in other factions he's quite difficult to kill, which is more advice for fighting Dwarf Lords in campaign really. PASS!
*'''Runelord:''' (DLC) Yes, yes yes. The one competitive General in multiplayer, the Runelord is just a walking bubble of passive buffs that make your low tier units good, and your good infantry units even better. Has good active abilities, like Master Rune of Oath & Steel which gives +30 armour to all dwarfs in range, or the Rune of Speed which adds 45% speed and 24 melee attack to all dwarfs in range. This is the lord pick that supports the dwarf army, and don't think he's some kind of wizard that dies when someone looks at him funny, while the melee defence is low at 40, the Runelord has the same 120 armour as the other lords, plus up to 35% missile resistance, sharing 20% of that with nearby allies. Slapping him on an Anvil of Doom gives a special ability that causes enemy casters to automatically miscast for minor damage when near him. TL;DR fucks magic, gets buffs. - Good if you want Thorek but a bit cheaper.

===Legendary Heros (Clan Angrund Only)===
All [[Clan Angrund]] has such a strong relationship with their ancestors, they come back as ghosts. like all ghosts, they have a 75% physical resistance instead of magic resistance, With magic attacks, Unbreakable, but no armor and less heath than normal. they have Fear and terror making them good at chasing the enemy off. They themselves are weak to magic attacks, but who takes that much offense magic against dwarfs anyway?

*'''King Lunn Ironhammer:''' is one of the two ghost Thanes, being the offensive one, with slightly more Melee attack than a normal thane.
*'''Halkenhaf Stonebeard:''' the other ghost Thane, being the most defensive of the par with significantly lower melee attack but a very high defense of 65 and silver shield, letting him minge with enemies for a protracted time to proc terror routs.
*'''Throni Ironbrow:''' Mostlickly to take as he is a Runesmith, so someone that needs protection while also being in the front lines.
*'''Dramar Hammerfist:''' the ghost engineer so paying extra for a harder to kill gun lines buffer and better at chasing away those that try to disrupt them.

===Heroes===
*'''Master Engineer:''' Basically a must if you're running more than 2 artillery pieces, buffs artillery, has a decent sniper rifle of his own, not great in a fight with anything beyond hound packs and light cavalry, so don't expect him to be an effective guard for the cannons he's buffing. However if there is another unit nearby casting Entrenchment right before they rout will make the unit hold the line and fight even after being routed. On campaign they also boost your army's mobility. Aaaaaand the Dwarf Rework happened, buffing him even further with the ability of the Vampirate Gunnery Wight to restore lost ammo to artillery pieces for up to five times. Just too good to miss out on if you're bringing a bunch of cannons (and who doesn't, honestly).
*'''Runesmith:''' Basically a squishier version of the Runelord, has many of the same buffs, both passive and active. With the Dwarf rework, these guys have gone from being merely decent to amazing. While utilizing a rune puts every other rune on a shared cooldown, this only applies per caster; having multiple Runesmiths allows you to stack multiple buffs simultaneously or across multiple units without having to wait out the full 60 second global cooldown. They might not necessarily be an auto-include persay, but having one or two of these guys in your army is strongly recommended.
*'''Thane:''' While they still suffer from being slow, Thanes can be used more aggressively than legendary lords. Kit them out with the Rune of Slowness to gimp enemy mobility, or give them the Ironbeard's Ring and coordinate with a source of fire damage: Flame Cannons, Dragonback Slayers, Warriors of Dragonfire Pass, basic Irondrakes, or Brimstone Gyrocopters, all of these will deal serious damage to units inside the debuff aura.

===Infantry===
*'''Miners''': The closest thing to cannon fodder in the Dwarf Roster, miners are cheap AP units. Also give "speed" and breadth to Dawi list by vanguarding.
*'''Dwarf Warriors''': Did you know that a unit of Dwarf Warriors costs 475 gold but can hold against 3 units of Empire Swordsmen, costing 400 gold each, for just over 2 minutes and racking up roughly 90-100 kills before dying/breaking? Dwarf Warriors aren't great, just good, and are very much just a shield wall frontline. Dwarf Warriors are very cost-effective starting units. They will trade positively against most infantry that are tier 1-3 excluding units with high AP values or anti-infantry buffs. Dwarf Warriors aren't the same as elite heavy infantry however, they will break in time, if rear charged, if attacked by great weapon units, if hit with leadership debuffs, or if attacked by characters. This is a unit that buys time for a unit in the second line to get in position to assist, do not assume you can just deploy them as a single line and have artillery sit safely behind them.
**'''Warriors of Dragonfire Pass'''(ROR): Slightly better warriors that deal fire damage in combat, not a guaranteed pick most of the time, but good against any faction that is vulnerable to fire, consider pairing with a Thane carrying Ironbeard's Ring to boost damage.
*'''Dwarf Warriors (Great Weapons)''': You know how Dwarf Warriors can hold frontlines for a time but need a second line unit to assist them, this is cheapest of the second line units. Regular warriors have shields, 40 Melee Defence, and charge defence against large units, Warriors with Great Weapons don't have those defences, they get armour piercing damage which is the kind of offence needed to make up for the vanilla warriors' shortcomings. Don't try and use them as a frontline unit, and replace them when you can with other melee infantry.
*'''Longbeards''': Warriors +1 really, they buff the leadership of other units (it's the generic Encourage passive so no stacking with lords), so consider mixing them with warriors. Cost-wise your mostly paying for better Melee Defence, better Leadership, the leadership aura, and Immune to Psychology compared to vanilla Warriors. A common question is which is better for cost, Longbeards or Warriors, but outside of fighting undead armies that have tons of fear/terror effects, the answer to the question is; use both. While the differences between the two units are obvious in comparison, to the player on the other side of the battlefield it doesn't matter much because a Dwarf line is still a solid formation that is hard to break. Longbeards work good in the wings to buff leadership in the flanks, and having warrior units means you can save gold for more missile units and artillery.
*'''Longbeards (Great Weapons)''': While the difference between shield Warriors and shield Longbeards isn't much, the great weapon variant favours the Longbeards, which come with Charge Defense and Armor-Piercing (but no target specialization). In MP, where every gold coin counts, if all you need is cheap AP, take the Warriors, but if you want something tankier and able to encourage your dwarfs to hold out a bit longer, take these guys.
**'''The Grumbling Guard'''(ROR): Not too bad, stat wise its a bit more armour & melee attack, 10 more leadership, and 13 more Melee Defence, which puts them at a whopping 51 Melee Defence. You don't get any improved damage output with these guys, instead you get an ability that replenishes 9% of vigour for them and nearby allies. This may not sound like much, but fatigue debuffs are crippling for units, and Dwarfs rely on grinding things out so even a small vigour buff to some units is good even if it just moves them from exhausted to very tired. But wait, this ability has infinite uses and a low cooldown so spam it away. While Hammerers do the same job but better, the Grumbling Guard are fantastic for keeping Ironbreakers in better condition than their enemies.
*'''Slayers''': Slayers are kind of weird. They're unbreakable, quick (for a Dwarf), hit hard, and do a lot of damage with no consideration to survivability. This means that they can seriously fuck up higher-tier units but on the same time are vulnerable to cannon fodder. It does not matter if you're a crappy goblin with a crappy spear, it's getting through a Slayer's hide as much as a Chosen's Daemonforged Axe. When using Slayers, hold them back so that other units, especially ones with charge defense, take the brunt of the charge before moving the slayers to counter-attack, and while it might cost you the charge bonus, having them attack through the buffer unit really improves the lifespan of your slayers (Probably much to their chagrin). Note that if you ever leave them in the open, missile units just have to imagine shooting them to wipe the unit, which is an expensive mistake. Also a definite must take against vampire counts and Tomb Kings with all their fear effects but do not ever think about using them against Vampire Pirates because they will get shot to pieces before any fear/terror units get close for the unbreakable to matter. Also, leave them at home against Wood Elves, or if you have fore-knowledge that your opponent likes horse-archer tactics.
*With the Dwarf rework that dropped together with Thorek Ironbrow, they went from terrible in Single Player to a pretty good choice for the early game, since you can now recruit them anywhere as long as your grudge meter is up. It also makes unlimited Slayer Doomstacks lead by Ungrim Ironfist a terrifying sight to behold.
**'''Dragonback Slayers'''(ROR): Slayers with better MA & MD, and they get physical resistance on top of the shield defense. The real value comes with their passive that activates in melee, it gives them fire damage, fire resistance, and applies slow debuff and the flammable trait for weakness to fire (doesn't stack if the enemy already has the flammable trait, but will stack with other effects of a different name that reduce fire resistance). The physical resist, slow debuff and the combo of fire damage and flammable debuff makes this unit a generally better pick over vanilla slayers, note that they do not get the fire resistance outside of combat so getting hit by flaming missiles outside of combat will hurt, the lore of fire spells are still subject to dwarf magic resistance though.
*'''Giant Slayers''': These are just super slayers, too costly to run a lot of. They will instantly blend light cavalry units like Marauder Horsemen or Ellyrian Reavers that dare to charge them, not that you should be using them to counter these units, it's just funny to see happen. Giant Slayers are basically Ungrim Ironfist as many Dwarfs instead of one. What they don't kill will be pretty close to death. Cannon fodder might counter slayers, but Giant Slayers dish out enough melee damage that you only need to worry about elite infantry and high mass units charging them. More vulnerable to shooting as they don't get the missile defense that Slayers get, these guys are expensive but do the job. Not recommended as a staple unit in army builds due to their cost, but good to pick if you're against monster or cavalry heavy armies.
*'''Hammerers''': Your well-armored, AP Damage dealing elite Dwarfs, not the same tank as a Longbeard but will deal serious AP damage. They've been reworked in the latest game, giving them substantially more health and magical(!) damage, meaning they're your best chance against Daemons and Treekin. **Still the same weaknesses as before, though: they're a Hammer (heh) in an Army of Anvils, so they'll mostly be pushing their way through your infantry
**Peak Gate Guard(ROR): The ultimate anti-armor unit, they go through heavily armored units like swordsmen through skavenslaves and then let other Dawi also participate in the fun.

===Ranged Infantry===
*'''Thunderers''': Like Empire handgunners, but you don't need to babysit them as much. A very useful unit even in the lategame that won't break the bank.
*'''Irondrakes:''' Where the fun begins. Ridiculously high damage output, solidly armoured. Need positioning to work right, but will absolutely demolish anything that you point them at. Their flamethrowers are considered artillery so they cannot be blocked by shields and inflict morale penalty upon anything they hit. They are surprisingly strong in melee against infantry if not deployed in a thin line because the back row can use their flamethrowers at point-blank, but not against cavalry as they'll pierce till the back row.
**'''The Skolder Guard'''(ROR): Replaces Lava for Steam to be an anti-armor unit. Much tougher than an Irondrakes with Physical resistance which is nice to have when the enemy gets a sneaky charge. They will multch full-plate units quickly given they have an even faster reload speed but watch out as you will also burn through their limited ammunition just as quickly. Against enemies with less armor you're better off using regular Irondrakes.
*'''Irondrakes (Trollhammer Torpedo)''': the Anti large version of the Irondrakes, having rocket launchers instead of Flamers. Often times Irondrakes can just melt through the armor of most things they are pointed at, sometimes they are Cavalry or monsters that have enough armor to shrug off that current of magma. Unlike regular Irondrakes they can shoot over units and obstacles. Don't be fooled by how their torpedoes explode, they don't do splash damage and should only attack infantry if you don't have anything bigger to shoot.

===Combined Infantry===
*'''Quarrellers''': Boring but practical. Like dwarf warriors, they're able to trade shots with the tier 1 ranged units of pretty much every other faction and winning because they come with shields on top of their dwarf armor. They also come with armor piercing, which makes them a budget option for shooting stuff like chaos warriors. However, they do less DPS per gold spent than similar units like empire crossbowmen and darkshards.
**As mentioned above, Thorek brings out the best in these guys, keeping them very relevant even to the late game. The shield variant is best used against missile-heavy factions like Wood Elves, but does nothing against Artillery.
*'''Quarrellers (Great Weapons)''': Similar to Quarrelers, except they give up shields in exchange for armor-piercing melee weapons. Won't win much in close combat, but they'll take down more enemies before they're overwhelmed, particularly against squishy units like harpies.
**Thorek buffs them to an insane degree to the point that when combined with all the relevant campaign bonuses, Quarrelers will become the core of your army. They're still not a frontline since they only have so many models in a unit, but 6-10 of these guys can outright delete anything that gives your Longbeards and Ironbreakers a hard time (Mammoths, stonehorns, even Rogue Idols). They also autoresolve very well, taking more losses than the shielded variant, but will take less losses than your frontline infantry.
*'''Miners (Blasting Charges)''': take that Cheap miner, then give them a single volley for bomb-throwing. Each model only gets one bomb, so make it count. Turn off ''Fire at Will'' and select the targets manually. A well-thrown Blasting Charge will decimate most charging infantry.
**'''Ekrund Miners'''(ROR): A regiment that Gets 3 Blasting Charges instead of 1. Depending on how well you managed them, that's paying less gold then recruiting 3 Blasting Charge Miners which matter very much in the gold restricted multiplayer.
*'''Ironbreakers''': The fact that Ironbreakers are one of the toughest units in the game would make them a key part of a Dawi late game army. Add to that blasting charges and you have something which can stomp most other infantry into the ground, blowing away a quarter of their hitpoints and ruining their charge before finishing off the survivors. Their only downside is that their damage in hand to hand is not that great, but that's what thunderers, slayers and artillery is for. NEVER let artillery, including artillery towers, target them. They're so slow they're target practice and they're no.1 priority as dwarfs don't have anything bigger.
**'''Norgrimlings Ironbreakers''':(ROR) Even better Ironbreakers, With bigger model size (so more bombes and unit health), a faster throwing arm, Vanguard, and Immune to Psychology. Overall a more powerful unit that can holds back the hords for longer while dealing more casualties.
*'''Rangers''': Sneaky Dwarf Quarrellers getting Vanguard and Stalk for a surprise Dwarf ambush. They have better speed to help with positioning and catching enemies at least when compared to other Dawi. They're armour is pretty good for most armies, but among Dwarfs they're on the lower end of defenses.
*'''Rangers (Great Weapons)''': Ranger equivalent of Quarrellers(Great Weapons) with one key difference; unlike the great weapon Quarreler the Rangers give up their crossbows entirely in favor of shorter ranged, higher AP throwing axes. Surprise AP flanking is a thing any Dwarf list could ask for. Keep in mind that each dwarf only carries 8 axes, so they'll run out much quicker than other rangers. Once they run out of throwing axes they become a decent anti-armour skirmishing unit, although their low defense means they need to chose their opponents carefully.
**'''Ulthar's Raiders'''(ROR) a unit your should be more careful with than just normal Rangers with Great Weapons, as they get the [[Witch Hunter]]'s ability to Mark a unit for death. You do get a fair amount of range despite having only infantry speed, being able to strip an enemy of a lot of their protection they had against ranged weapons. Good take if your using a Focus fire strategy, assuming your can keep the Raiders safe while making back their cost.
*'''Bugman's Rangers''' Surprisingly not a ROR. Improved Rangers, having the regenerative and drunkenness properties of Bugman's liquid courage. they are better at fighting off harassers while their improved shooting and HP recovery help them win archer fights. These are to Rangers as Longbeards are to Warriors: a straight upgrade assuming you can afford it. In MP, they can last longer without support and work best if you're good at micro. If not, you're probably better just leaving them at home in favor of more units of regular rangers.

===Cavalry===
Does not exist. See Slayers, Rangers and Air Units if you want something fast, you beardling.

===Artillery===
*'''Bolt Thrower:''' Your cheaper anti-large Artillery. More accurate and shoots faster than a cannon, but outclassed by them in splash and penetration power. Best used to take out elite cavalry and monsters in the early campaign.
*'''Grudge Thrower''': Your first artillery unit. Fills a role like an Empire Mortar as a long-range anti-infantry weapon giving it has the largest radius of splash damage on impact.
**'''Gob-Lobber (Grudge Thrower)(ROR)''': Like the Grudge Thrower, but better. Also has live Goblins bolted to the projectiles. Causes morale penalties to targets, which stacks with the penalty for being hit by artillery.
*'''Cannon:''' Your classic artillery. Slow to fire but harder to dodge, best used as an Anti-large weapon while also killing models in high armor units, through can have difficulties hitting if the enemy zigzags too much like most Artillery units.
*'''Organ Gun:''' An effective horse begone tool, with good armor piercing and a ton of cannon balls flying everywhere, cavalry will quickly and efficiently die off in droves as your foe rages, if there’s no cav to shoot, then this thing is good for pulping infantry and can do a decent job at eliminating chariots.
*'''Flame Cannon''' Jack-of-all-trades artillery. Great area damage to deal with blobs of infantry and while it doesn't cause AP damage, its base damage is high enough that it doesn't matter. Funny enough, its stats make it much better at breaking towers and walls than cannons.

===Air Units===
The closest thing to "cavalry". Flying Bombers. Fill a role as the fast-moving guns to shoot at enemy flanks and drop anti-infantry bombs. The rotor blades can also dish out a good amount of melee damage, but having almost no melee defense makes them relatively fragile despite having high armor. They are often safe in the air, but keep them away from other flyers and AP missiles. Despite this, they are absurdly fast having speed in the 200s to run from most problems (only Pegasus Knights or Hawk Riders could catch them without nets or debuffs). To use effectively will require some mico.

*'''Gyrobomber:''' Your dedicated bomber which sacrifices other aspects to be the best at that. As a single mobile unit dedicated to hovering over infantry to drop annihilating bombs multiple times during a game, they obviously require the most micromanagement. A well placed carpet bombing can absolutely devastate the enemy frontline, and its machine gun can put out Ratling-Gun levels of DPS on a much more mobile platform.
Important to note that on small unit scale, the gyrobombers bombs are not reduced in damage, so one gyrobomber becomes an army-shredding machine on that unit scale, and putting 2-3 or even more in every army will be an auto-win for the campaign
**'''Skyhammer(ROR)''': Drops cluster bombs, so be aware that the damage-area is greater than the marker shows. Basically the Dwarfs answer to big aoe magic to obliterate chaff and elite units alike.
*'''Gyrocopter:''' Your anti-infantry skirmishers, shooting and bombing out those enemy gunners and artillery that thought themselves safe so far in the back. Also good at harassing the harassers that thought they could run a circle around the slowly pivoting Dawi gun lines.
*'''Gyrocopter (Brimstone Gun):''' Switches from general anti-infantry to majority AP damage to harass and focus down targets with more armor. Generally speaking, superior in almost every way to regular Gyrocopters. Fire damage puts a serious dent in units with regeneration (and Wood Elves) and the lower base damage is neglible when you take AP into consideration.

==Tactics==
===Multiplayer Strategies===
Dwarfs are one of the most unique factions in the game battle wise, with an utter lack of mobility and magick, and focusing everything on tanky infantry that can deal decent damage, and powerful guns and artillery. Unfortunately for them, this uniqueness means that unless you're fighting other Dwarfs, you don't have any balanced match ups against other races. Against some you have a clear, obvious advantage and tend to stomp, and against others, they give you swirlies in the bathroom for your lunch money. This is why most competitive players think they're one of the best counterpick factions as you can avoid your bad match ups and play in a favorable situation. Anyway, here's how you can satisfy the grudge against the other races:

*'''Beastmen''': A rush faction, Beastmen will have a hell of a time against you, if you play your cards right. Their complete lack of armor leaves them quite vulnerable to Thunderer fire on the approach and Bolt Throwers can slice through Minotaurs and Cygors with relative ease. Keep a solid screen of staunch Dwarf Warriors between your ranged units and the enemy and bring (Giant) Slayers to turn the Bestigor and Centigor Herds into ground beef.

*'''Bretonnia''': The peasantry of the Bretonnians can safely be ignored (except Foot Squires, after their buffs they can actually fuck you up pretty good), as they'll struggle to do anything to your heavy armor. Instead, you'll want to focus on bringing down their armored cavalry, particularly the Grail Knights and Grail Guardians leading the charges into you. Trollhammer Irondrakes serve fantastically as a powerful Horse-B-Gone tool and your Giant Slayers can chunk through most of their cavalry so long as they're not the ones receiving the initial charge. Bolt Throwers are, again, a powerful tool to use while the Bretonnian cav is on the approach. Just make sure that you keep your flanks thoroughly secure.

*'''[[Total_War_Warhammer/Tactics/Chaos_Dwarfs| Chaos Dwarfs]]''': Here's the thing about the Dawi-Zharr: their Dwarf units are generally better than yours one-on-one but are far more expensive. You can fill the field with heavily armored and relatively cheap infantry while they have to fill it with greenskin slaves.As a result your army as a whole has better staying power than theirs. Your Thunderers in particular are much cheaper than Fireglaives and have better range than Blunderbusses. Chaos Dwarf artillery can pose a big problem as you are pretty stationary and that's what they love but your cannons get a lot more shots per unit than theirs do and if you play your cards right you can win artillery duels. Watch out for Magma Cannons however, as the burning vortex their shots leave behind can really mess up an artillery crew - focus them down first if possible. Chaos Dwarfs also have lots of big monsters and chariots which will be a problem for you just as they always are. Your best bet is to shoot them down ASAP and if all else fails have a few Slayers in reserve. Gryrobombers can do pretty good against clumped Chaos Dwarf elite infantry and have a place in this matchup.

*'''Daemons of Chaos''': Expect Khorne Furies and a mostly Slaanesh-roster. see Slaanesh's guide below on how to deal with this. The good news is that since daemons of Chaos don't have access to greater daemon lords, you 'might' be able to deal with their hero-class lords. But this is mostly a full pain matchup for you, due to the access to the Slaanesh-roster daemons have.

*'''Chaos Warriors''': For Grungni's sake, keep your distance! Chaos Warriors are as tough as you are and hit harder in melee. Stock up on Thunderers and cannons, and bring some great weapon fighters to finish them off. Slayers can help as long as you're careful to make sure the enemy can't hit back. Keep your eyes out for flanking cavalry and chariots, and pray to the gods you can shoot those heathens before they reach your lines!

*'''Dark Elves''': This is a really tricky matchup for you; Dark Elves are fast and bring absurd AP damage in melee and at a range. Your biggest advantage is your superior range and you'll need to lean on it heavily to stand a chance. Grab cannons, Grudge Throwers, Rangers, and Quarrelers and hope to Grungi you can shoot them down before they get close enough to return the favor.

*'''Dwarfs''': Hopefully you have a general idea on the strengths of this faction, you're playing as them! Anti-Armor, full stop. Organ Guns, take the Skolder Guard and bring some Hammerers to crack open your opponent's can.

*'''Empire''': The Empire can be a tricky one because they're almost as good at artillery as you are while also having good cavalry and skirmishers. You'll need to stock up on gyrobombers to disrupt their flanking cavalry and Slayers to take out their knights. Irondrakes can also work well at deleting any aggressive demigryphs or knights. Beyond that, you should double down on your strengths and keep your artillery safe; the human lines will break before yours do.

*'''Greenskins''': As satisfying as it is to bury an axe in a greenskins skull, you are better off dealing with these guys from a distance. Quarrelers and Rangers are your friends here; quantity is as important as quality when fending off a green tide. Organ Guns and Cannons will be better at dealing with monsters than your Slayers, you don't want to send unarmoured units against Arachnarok Spiders or Rogue Idols. Don't forget your Irondrakes and/or your flame cannons, they can melt down anything from goblins to stone trolls. And keep your flanks protected from chariots and pump-wagons, they can wreak havoc on your lines and just ruin your day.

*'''Grand Cathay''': This is another instance of a faction that does what you do, only a hell of a lot worse. Yeah, you won't have to worry too much about these guys when they show up. Your missile boxes beat their missile boxes, their Cav is subpar and will get eaten by Slayers, and the only AP infantry that they have is Anti Large, which you don't have. Box up, get some cannons and Quarrelers, sit back and enjoy some Bugmans as the Cathayans desperately try to figure out how the fuck they're getting into your backline. Yes they do have their own little airforce, but do you really think Umgi inventions can compete with Dawi Gyrocopters? No. If they bring Sky Junks, send some Gyrocopters after them to pick them down. This faction might get more scary as DLC comes out, but for now this should be an easy win as long as you know what you're doing.

*'''High Elves''': Don't let the War of the Beard fool you, this will be one of your hardest match ups. High Elves have a lot of things that threaten you, but the things to fear the most would be their Chariots, Mages, White Lions and <s>Sisters of Averlorn</s> (they do magic damage so their AP isn't as useful as you think). Seriously, any High Elf player who knows what they're doing is going to spam White Lions and it is going to SUCK. Your best bet is to spam either Gyrocopters or Cannons and spread the field. Force the High Elves to have to either attack your artillery emplacements one at a time, allowing your others to fire freely, or use your air power and artillery to spread them apart and pick off pockets. Hammerers also have a niche in this match up, because they beat White Lions pretty hard one-on-one and with support from guns or chaff, they can go toe to toe with Swordmasters (Though don't count on that). Of course, these plans aren't perfect. There's a 99% chance they will bring Alarielle for Tempest and heals to deal with Gyros and they have plenty of mobility to get at your cannons to give the White Lions time to get in. Sadly, this is one of those match ups where even if you bring the most optimized Anti Elgi list possible, there's still a pretty decent chance you'll lose. Avoid this match up if you can.

*'''Khorne''': It's Khorne, c'mon. Warriors of chaos with somehow even less ranged and even killier once they reach your front lines. Bring plenty of armor-piercing infantry and ranged. If you want to live, protect your artillery from Khorne's furies and calvary.

*'''Kislev''': Kislev's big weakness is that their ranged firepower is also their melee power due to hybrid units, and while this seems great at first glance, they sacrifice both elements to have the other. Your artillery and ranged firepower will dump all over Kislev, your biggest concern are War Bears and Sleds, to which you should apply Slayers. Focus down the wizards and you'll out-brutalize Kislev in good time.

*'''Lizardmen''': Lizardmen are a bit of a mixed bag. On one hand, you can scoff at all the Skinks as they ping impotently off of your armor (unless they're the Red-Crested variety). On the other, Saurus are just as stubborn as you are and will take days to chew through without good AP. Bring some Hammerers to eek out an advantage in the inevitable grindfest you'll end up in. Take advantage of the Lizardmen's dearth of ranged firepower and massacre their forces with Irondrakes and Thunderers, while your Dwarf Warriors hold their front line at bay. You have excellent anti-monster units in the form of your Giant Slayers who absolutely will butcher any big dinosaur thrown into your ranks so long as you have some chaff to help trap and soak the damage the beasties can toss about. Though Skinks will largely prove a minor nuisance at best to a majority of your forces, you will ''definitely'' want to screen your (Giant) Slayers from the Skirmishing variety. Key players to watch out for are going to be the Slann Mage-Priests, Skink Priests and Kroxigors. Slann, especially fire/high Slann and Heavens Skink Priests can wreak utter havoc upon your forces with the myriad of vortex spells they can toss out, like candy from a parade float and they should absolutely be prioritized if you find them on the field. (Sacred) Kroxigors, if fielded, are surprisingly vicious anti-infantry monsters and will bowl over a majority of the infantry they're pointed at. Giant Slayers and Trollhammer Irondrakes serve as a solid counter, but you'll still want to swamp the Kroxigors in chaff to mitigate the damage they deal in turn.

*'''Norsca''': This is an easy fight for you. All of that monster hunting anti-large equipment the Norscans bring is going to fly right over your head as you bury your axes in their unarmoured pecs. Bring plenty of Cannons and Bolt Throwers to shoot down enemy Mammoths and bring some Irondrakes to shoot down anything else. Norscans are usually unarmoured, so you can trade your Thunderers for Quarrelers for the better range. Stick to the basics and you'll do fine.

*'''Nurgle''': Holy shit, a faction that might actually be slower than you! And it seems like you will have a hefty advantage as they don't really have a lot of ways to stop your artillery. The biggest thing you will probably have to worry about is their air force, and Furies and Rotflies will be gunning for that back line. Keep some Slayers near your guns, and get ready to surround them if they try to land. After that you just got to deal with Nurgle's rush of Plaguebearers and Nurglings, and I hope you're ready for nothing to ever die ever because that's likely what is gonna happen when Dawi and Nurgle clash. On the ground, Plague Toads and Pox Riders will likely be your biggest threat with their anti-infantry, but they're also big models, so guns and Slayers should do the trick. Expect a Herald as the commander, and if he's dumb enough to bring a Great Unclean One, laugh and shoot it to pieces. With the new debuffs fire damage does to healing, it might also be wise to break out the Irondrakes and Flame Cannons -- you'll have plenty of time to lob napalm at those shambling hordes of Plaguebearers.
** CoC DLC has brought some changes with access to marked WoC units for Nurgle; the units you will definitely see in this match-up now include Nurgle-marked Chaos Knights, Nurgle-marked Chaos Chariots, Nurgle-marked Chaos Warriors/Chosen with Great Weapons and Nurgle Marauder Horsemen with throwing axes. Knights & Chariots are especially a threat, as they will survive long enough from their speed+armour+Nurgle Mark to get behind your lines and wipe artillery or rear-charge your line infantry. Great weapon Warriors/Chosen, while still vulnerable to your guns when getting to your lines, are both units that have respectable chances of beating your units in the grind with their standard WoC stats, but now plus the Nurgle Mark. The Nurgle Warshrine is a strong support piece for the army, but like a GUO its something Dwarfs can delete so easily that you really should not see it. Generally expect Nurgle armies facing you to have a decent share of Nurgle-marked Mortal units from WoC now, unless your opponent hates themselves.

*'''Ogre Kingdoms''': This match is either gonna be your easiest or your hardest, as this comes down to the skill of you, the Ogre player, and what units you brought to the table. The Ogres have massive charge bonuses, but a lot of your units have charge defense, however unlike other factions, the Ogres will only lose half due to their Ogre Charge trait. The biggest threat the Ogres bring to you is their artillery, and if you leave them be they'll reap a devasting toll on your infantry. The good news is, that with the exception of Leadbelchers, all their artillery are a single model. Have your Cannons and Gyrocopters focus them down and you are good to go, or so you would think. Besides the Gnoblars, Ogres are all monster units, which means two things. One is that your artillery and Slayers will have a field day, but two is that their shockingly fast speed means they're gonna out run you and try to outmaneuver you at every opportunity. Your army should be a good balance of Longbeards, or if you are pinching pennies, Dwarf Warriors, they all have charge defense and can help hold the charging balls of lubber back. This is one of the match up where having a ton of Slayers is a good thing, and stack up on them to defend your back lines and cut the Ogres down to size. Your artillery should consist of two, maybe three Cannons to take out artillery and thin their numbers. Irondrakes with Trollhammer Torpedoes won't be a bad call, but they're on the pricey end. Besides some of their units, bring at least two, or simply one unit of Thunderers at most, because a lot of their stuff is unarmored, your main missile troop should be Quarrelers, they're cheap and will have a good time turning Ogres into pin-cushions and are strong enough to fend off Sabertusks. Your artillerys targeting priority should look something like this: artillery units (Ironblasters first, then Leadbelchers), Stonehorns, and finally, everything else. This should be the only match up where you shouldn't bother bringing Miners with Blasting Charges. The only thing they'll have an effect on is Gnoblars and strictly that, which is a waste of cash and will earn you a grudge for being wasteful. Now get out there and strike out some grudges agaisnt the fat bastards!

*'''Skaven''': This is probably the closest we'll get to a 40k-esque matchup (you know, <strike>aside the irony of neither the [[Squats|Dwarfs]] or Skaven being in that setting</strike> [[Leagues of Votann|The Kin has declared a Grudge against the manling who wrote that]]). Between your guns and artillery and their guns and artillery, most of the damage either of you will be dealing to each other will be done from afar. A majority of the Skaven infantry is quite helpless against your frontline infantry, but you'll have a hell of a time pinning anything down with the Skavens quicker movement speeds. Grudge Throwers are going to be king against most Skaven infantry builds, while Bolt Throwers or Cannons should be fielded to snipe any Warp-Lighting Cannons, Plagueclaw Catapults or Hellpit Abominations they have downfield. Warplock Jezzails will be a priority target to focus fire down, as are Warpfire Throwers and Poison Wind Globadiers, should they start getting too close. Aside utilizing their missile units against them, Skaven have absolutely no aerial presence, meaning your Gyrocopters will have virtually free reign to gun down rats at will.

*'''Slaanesh''': A bad day for you all around. It's become apparent, that if you're unlucky enough to run into Slaanesh, you're going to want to forego ranged firepower almost entirely, Miners with Blasting Charges and Ironbreakers will trade efficiently, maybe a safety pick of Thunderers to deal with a Keeper Of Secrets, but AP on everything, Furies, Spawn and chariots will just pulverize your formations in one of the most one-sided setups in the game right now.

*'''Tomb Kings''': The good news is that Tomb Kings don't like fire, and you have fire aplenty. Brimstone Gun-equipped Gyrocoptors are your fastest fire-delivery system, but Irondrakes and Flame Cannons are useful as well. The bad news is, that you don't like chariots, and they have chariots aplenty. Use every trick you can to soften up the chariots before they hit your lines; but it's unlikely you'll be able to stop them all. Grab some Giant Slayers to finish off the ones that survive your barrage and hope it's enough to keep them down. Tomb Kings infantry is no match for you, so you should build your army against their monsters and chariots.

*'''Tzeentch''': Ooh, here is somebody that's going to hate you. Tzeentch units are squishy and their ranged units only have middling range and are better for kiting. He also has no artillery other than Soul Grinders, few big monsters outside of Lords of Change, and relies heavily on spamming spells to activate their army abilities. Bring a Runelord or Thorek on an Anvil of Doom and laugh as their casters explode. Otherwise, pound them into dust with artillery, as they have few answers to an army with better range than them. Just guard the back line against Furies and Doom Knights and don't bother with air units, they'll get shot down in short order.

*'''Vampire Coast''': The most common Vampire Coast strategy is to bunker up with a large number of cheap ranged units and heavy artillery. If that sounds familiar, it's only because it's the same thing you like to do, you're just better at it. Bring plenty of Cannons and some Slayers to deal with the enemy monsters (hint: kill the Necrofex Colossi first). Once the big monsters have been dealt with, the pirates are basically just an inferior version of you, clumps of Quarrelers and Thunderers are plenty to take down the Zombies. And remember not to bunker up too tightly; you may have magic resistance but Winds of Death will still hurt.

*'''Vampire Counts''': Virtually nothing that makes up the rank and file of the Vampire Counts will pose a significant threat to you. Skeletons and Zombies will only serve to slow down your already plodding advance and only deal any meaningful "damage" to you simply by sponging your limited ranged firepower meant for something else. The only standard units that you'll find yourself at a significant disadvantage against will be the Cairn and Hex Wraiths, given your general lack of magical damage. You'll want to engage them with missile attacks for maximum effect and make sure that you are braced for their charges. The main thing you should be focused on taking down will be the Lords and Heroes leading the army; without them, the undead hordes will quickly fall apart (literally). They also pose the single biggest threat to everything you have, as their Lore of Death casters can delete swathes of your army with a single well placed cast if you are positioned carelessly.

*'''Wood Elves''': Wood Elves are an extremely annoying foe who are fundamentally the exact opposite of you. Their infantry can run circles around yours and they can deal frightening amounts of damage against their intended targets, but you'll snap their twiggy spines if you whip 'em with your beards. In general, you're going to be engaged in a very tedious game of "keep away", where the Wood Elves are going to be dancing just outside of your reach while their Glade Guard and Waywatchers pepper you with AP arrows and occasionally test your flanks for weaknesses via Wild Rider/Great Stag Knight cycle charges. Fortunately, you do have a couple tools the elves don't: Artillery. Grudge Throwers excel against WE infantry and can discourage them from trying to camp too far away, while Bolt Throwers and Flame Cannons will make mince-meat of the cavalry/Forest Spirits that may try to break through your lines. Speaking of Forest Spirits, Irondrakes will ''incinerate'' them. Slayers also help against the bigger tree spirits in theory, but the ranged power the Wood Elves bring make them a dicey proposition. As far as their melee infantry options are concerned, the only ones that majorly threaten you are the Bladesingers; their anti-armor magical attacks will scythe through your armor will jaw-dropping speed. Use Thunderers to soften them up on the charge then use Slayers to cut them down swiftly.

===Domination===
General Tier Rank: '''F'''

You are just SO FUCKING SLOW. You opponent is going to get to the point first, no question about it and most armies have plenty of ways to roadblock you in order to stop you from getting on them. While few factions will be able to contest you in a head on charge for the midpoint, once they start going for the side points you will have no way to out contest them. Important to note that there are some maps that you won't get completely dumpstered automatically. The more choke points that are on a map, the better it is for you because then the enemy will be more forced to try to take you head on instead of just avoid direct contact with you in an attempt to cap more points. However, even then there's no way you can outmaneuver your enemy unless they fall asleep at their computer out of boredom. Don't play Dwarfs in Domination until they get some major buffs, a DLC, or rework that will help them move around the map better.

However if you still decide to stay committed to playing dwarfs, the general tip is seize two caps at least and have a squadron of gyrocopters and bombers to harass the foe, ironbreakers are king here, jam them on a point and laugh as your opponent struggles to get them off, rangers and miners are key here as they are the only units with vanguard deployment (this includes the ROR ironbreakers) to delay the foe by brawling with them as your slower units get into position or to reinforce your troops if needed, slayers are necessary here as besides gyrocopters, their the fastest thing you got, bring along 3, 4 if needed, to both delete cav or monsters too big for their britches and do aforementioned delaying tactics, for artillery, on smaller maps, organ guns and flame cannons will be an excellent infantry/cavalry begone tool for clearing out points that are infested with enemy troops, as per the norm, bring a cannon to deal with enemy artillery and snipe monsters regardless of the map size, on longer maps, the grudge-thrower will be a much better alternative for clearing out points, but organ guns and flame cannons are a good deterrent for defending points, as they’ll delete blobs, just make sure there safe from enemy cav and flyers, however the one weakness as listed above, is your slowness, you need to be smart if you want to consistently win domination as dwarfs, assume a box formation as units in said shape, turn about faster and thus let them react to threats flanking around or move to different points faster if it’s necessary (keep in mind, it does not increase movement speed, it just hastens how fast they turn), while it is vulnerable to artillery fire, your cannons should already be firing at said artillery, follow this guide somewhat well and proceed to wipe every smug grin off with an axe, show every YouTuber good or otherwise how wrong they were as you strike out grudges and get vengeance for every domination tier list that put you in F tier!

===Campaign Strategies===
*'''Karaz-A-Karak''': Karaz-A-Karak starts out with a solid base economy and a protected position, with your flanks covered by minor dwarven factions and only one Greenskin faction as your initial enemy. However, that start is deceivingly simple at first; once Grimgor and Queek get going, your position will become increasingly precarious if you're not careful. Your biggest weakness is easily your very slow growth, as the Greenskins and Skaven often will have higher tier units much sooner than you do. Making the jump from Tier 3 to 4 as soon as you can is your top priority. Once your scary lategame units arrive, you can start to dominate the Southlands and expand in any direction you damn please.
**'''Pick Gronbrimdal (Mortal Empires only)''': There is no reason to ever pick Thorgim over Grombrindal as your starting LL. Grombrindal comes with a much better selection of starting units (Gyrocopters, Irondrakes and Thunderers) and his blue skill tree might be one of the most blatantly overpowered things in the game on its own, as Grombrindals variants of the perks not just affect his army, but your entire faction. Thorgrim can be recruited later down the line regardless.
**'''Don't get bogged down''': The initial 50 turns of any campaign might just be called "get ready for Grimgor". While you can expand quickly at the start, it is ill advised (and very tempting) to stray too far from your Capital and end up with your armies battering against your starting enemies while Grimgor happily carves a path straight towards Karaz-A-Karak. Losing Karaz-A-Karak becomes a win condition in this case; if you can successfully defend it, the Greenskins are finished, if you lose it, you can restart a new campaign.

'

*Clan Angrund''' In immortal empires Belegar's difficulty level has been severely reduced, on turn one as soon as you take your first settlement you can full-confederate Karak Izor instantly. After that it's the usual hop and skip to Karak-Eight-Peaks, however with it in Skarsnik's hands now, it's significantly easier to take as Skarsnik doesn't start with a full 20 stack army unlike the 'Crooked Moon Mutineers' from Warhammer 2.
[[Category:Total Warhammer]] {{Total War Warhammer Tactics}}

Total War Warhammer/Tactics/Dwarfs

2023-06-12T16:18:23Z

2A02:1810:4E2C:A900:DC0E:597F:F427:CBEB: /* Universal Traits */

{{Topquote|Kazukhan-kazakit-ha! (Look out, the Dwarfs are on the warpath!)|Game battle chant for Dwarfs, if you think about it, it should be look <s>down</s> THAT'S A GRUDGE!}}
This is the tactics page for the Total War: Warhammer version of The Dwarfs.

==Why play Dwarfs?==
*Because you want to sit and watch as your enemies are blasted away while coming towards you.
*Cause you're under 5'5 and want '''vengeance''' for all the short jokes.
*You don't want to do too much micro, so an army without much in the way of mobility and cavalry doesn't bother you as much.
*You enjoy having infantry that won't die after being slapped by a wet noodle.
*Slay everything without a beard!!
*FLAMETHROWERS!!!

===Pros===
*'''Durability''': You are a tank faction. Most of your units are categorized with high armour, melee defense and leadership. Even your tier one and chaff are very tanky compared to counterparts from other factions. This is further supplemented by the innate magic resist many of your units have, which ''slightly'' compensates for your otherwise complete lack of magic. Additionally, with their naturally high leadership, dwarfs do not usually break unless hopelessly outnumbered or if you screw up massively by getting cavalry charged in the rear. Frankly, your units will hold out forever.
**Your magic resistance got nerfed in the third game to ''only'' resist magical spells. Still useful, but now units with magic attacks, I.E Daemons, are going to be way better at cracking you open.
*'''Range''': Guns, guns and more guns! Dwarfs have some of the best blackpowder units in the entire game. Thunderers and Cannons can lay a whooping on anything they are firing on, and their artillery isn't anything to sneer at. Even their non-AP range units are very good for their price, and it's not hard for them to earn their points back as long as they are defended.
*'''If they get close, Nut 'em!''': As if being being one of the best factions at shooting was not enough, their missile units can also hold their own in close quarters better than most.
*'''Airforce''': Gyrocopters with their anti large can get you control over the air, and their ability to kite monsters into oblivion is a good skill to have. Even Gyrobombers have a niche for their blob killing capabilities after recent buffs.
*'''Runes''': Where other races rely on the fickle Winds of Magic, you have your reliable runes. Runes supply surprisingly good buffs and debuffs that can help your army out, making them a great way to make sure your infantry stays in the fight a bit longer. The fact that they aren't limited by a power reserve also means that they'll remain a viable option well into the latter stages of a fight, where other factions might begin to tap out of their mystical power.
*'''Anti-large''': You laugh when the enemy brings big monsters. With all your AP missiles, Anti Large artillery and slayers, you have the one of the easiest times killing monsters out of any faction in the game.
*'''Strong Economy''': It's campaign specific but yeah, it turns out the species who's renowned for being the best at making shit is also one of the best at making money. The resource building chains go up to level IV instead of stopping at level III, you can mass produce Dwarf Beer anywhere. Putting together Doomstacks of Top Tier Dawi troops is easier.
*'''Good for Beginners''': Everyone was just starting once, if you are new to Warhammer Total War or just Total War in general the Dawi are (ironically enough) forgiving. Something like the Wood Elves is fragile and has a limited margin for error, Dwarfs on the other hand have more of a fudge factor in most match ups. Not to say that it's easy mode playing dwarfs, but the likelihood of things going pear shaped in a second is lower.

===Cons===
*'''Lack of Mobility''': With no Cav, monsters and slow infantry, Dwarfs are the least mobile faction in the game. You will spend the majority of the game standing still.
*'''Lack of Magic''': Though your most recent rework makes your runes a damn good alternative, you don't really have magic. This can pose a problem when you face similarly physically durable armies in battle and lack a reliable, magical alternative for damage. Additionally, though you defensively have a 25% resistance to the arcane, many large vortex spells will still sting quite a bit and your complete lack of magical healing means it'll be hard to bounce back from the damage you do take.
*'''Chariots''': Chariots are the bane of a Dwarf players existence. They don't have any real way to lock them down and, as you'd expect, AP anti infantry can really kill what the Dwarfs want to do on the battlefield. Due to the rework to how bracing and knock down works, this isn’t as bad as before, but chariots can still be a problem
*'''Predictability''': Most veteran players know what's going to happen when Dwarfs are picked. They are going to go for a cheap, numerous and sturdy front line and a lot of guns and artillery. This means that Dwarfs are easy to plan for as they only have one real viable tactic. Building an army around fighting Dwarfs is something players from all races know how to do.
*'''Lack of Good Lord Options''': Do you like the Runelord or Thorek? No? Well you better start because in multiplayer they're your only viable options. Grombrindal is an ok duelist but honestly Dwarf lords in general kind of suck. With no mounts and no way to stick to their targets it's hard for them to get anything done. This problem got better with the Twisted and the Twilight due to the changes to knockdown effects, but sticking to targets will still be hard
*'''Hard campaign''': With all the changes to the factions around them, the Dawi have fallen on some pretty hard times. The lifetime of WH2 dotted the landscape around Karaz-A-Karak alone with a huge number of guaranteed enemies that you will have to look out for, with your most reliable allies in the Empire being very far away. The other subfactions don't fare much better and your slow growth seriously hurts your ability to expand, especially when compared with your most dominant enemies, the Greenskins of the Badlands and Clan Mors further down the road.
*'''Bad in Domination''': Turns out your stubby little legs makes it really hard for you to capture objectives. Due to your lack of mobility you can't effectively capture points since other factions can just out race you to them and get more units on them. As such, you're widely considered the weakest faction in Domination.
*'''DLC''': A con for everyone, but fortunately you get off easier than many others. Unfortunately, a couple of your best units, namely Runelords and Rangers, are in fact locked behind DLC and if you want to really use your Dwarfs to the fullest, you'll need to pay the toll.

==Universal Traits==

*'''The Great Book of Grudges''': The fact that the sacred Dammaz Kron went unmentioned on this pages for so long merits an entry on its own. The Book of Grudges documents every slight committed against your faction, including legendary grudges that you start out with. Whenever something bad happens, i.e. you lose a settlement, get raided or a hostile faction repeatedly trespasses on your turf without you allowing it, it merits an entry in the book. These entries can (and will) accumulate over time, and depending on how much your Dorfs disliked the transgression, will vary in severity, which fills up a meter that gives you some penalties and some bonusses. High severity from unresolved Grudges gives you minor public order and research speed penalties, but it also gives all of your armies a charge bonus (since the Dwarfs are so pissed off) and increases the chance of Slayers and Giant Slayers popping up in your Regiments of Renown pool, where they can then be recruited instantly into your armies. Resolving Grudges and Legendary Grudges (such as retaking Karak Eight Peaks as Belegar Ironhammer) also earns you powerful bonusses (Money, Oathgold, small Buffs for the entire faction ) and special Runes.
*'''Oathgold''': The secondary resource of the Dwarfs. Practically identical to the Mortuary Cult of the Tomb Kings, with the key difference being that the Dwarfs can make much more stuff with Oathgold and that the stuff is much more abundant. Oathgold is earned through resolving Grudges, doing missions and quests, Gold Mines and some special buildings such as the Brightstone Mine in Mount Gunbad. Oathgold, combined with trade goods, can be used to create items for your Lords and Heroes, which makes it downright trivial to kit out every single character on the map with some special gizmos to make them really powerful. Oathgold can also be used to make Character and Banner Runes, the former can be applied as equipment to individual characters (with up to 3 individual runes at maximum), the latter functions like Banners that you can give units to give them special bonusses and abilities.
*'''Expert Charge Defense''': Barring Slayers, every single one of your units has Expert Charge Defense, which nullifies charge bonusses and also the momentum of units charging into your staunch line of angry Dwarfs.
*'''Magic Resistance''': Every Dwarf has a built in 25% Magic Resist (Spell Resist in WH3). Consult the main page for WHFB Dwarfs as to why.

==Legendary Lords and Subfactions==
*'''Thorgrim Grudgebearer:''' The high king himself, and the only large non-war machine unit in your roster, as he is carried on a massive throne sled by some burly dwarfs, Thorgrim isn't huge on offence, better than say mid-tier combat lords, but he's mostly just a hard to kill brick of leadership. Dwarfs in range of him just become slightly harder to break, which isn't saying much given their default morale, and he's not easily sniped. This results in him being kind of underwhelming, you know he's not going to die like a bitch, but you also know that he's not exactly going to recoup even a quarter of his cost. Is kind of safe in campaign play for beginners, but Grombrindal is overall superior. - Pass.
*'''Ungrim Ironfist:''' The Slayer King, bane of anything taller than six feet, Ungrim is the opposite of Thorgrim; all offence, with low defence. Ungrim is actually pretty good in terms of being a hero-killer and monster-hunter, he's not going to solo Tyrion or Kroq-Gar, and don't even think of monster lords like Kholek or monstrous mounts such as a Tomb King on a war sphinx, without a unit to bog them down. The problem with Ungrim is that while he can throw hands and live up to his title, he eats a lot of damage for a dwarf, or just in general for a combat lord, he's easy to snipe with massed missiles if caught in the open, and while he can butcher most things sent his way, he'll only be able to do this once or twice in a battle before he's at serious risk of dying. Don't let that 120 armour & unbreakable make you think he's a tank, Ungrim's Melee Defence is quite low for a combat lord, and that low dwarf speed means he can by kited to death. Thorgrim lacks the damage to recoup his cost, Ungrim lacks the defence to recoup his costs. If playing with an ally that has access to Lore of Life he can be kept alive, but you're asking a lot of resources to support the Slayer King. - Pass.
*'''Grombrindal:''' THE WHITE DWARF, Grombrindal doesn't bring anything really special to the table, he's a decent duelist, although lacking the balls-to-the-wall offence of Ungrim Ironfist, Grombrinal is nowhere near as risky for a combat lord. The flashbomb ability can lockdown mobile heroes and give the white dwarf a few easy hits. Doesn't quite bring much for the rest of the army, but is the best legendary lord for cost-benefit tradeoffs. He can fight, he can survive, and he can make the entire army Unbreakable with a reusable map-wide buff. - Niche but competitive in that niche. In Campaign, he is easily the best LL the Dwarfs offer. His blue skill tree affects ''your entire faction'' and the four blessings you can choose every 20 turns (10 after picking a specific skill) are all very powerful, a whopping +25% Research Rate is no joke, as are +10 Melee Attack and Defense for every unit in Grombrindals army.
*'''Belegar Ironhammer:'''(DLC) Belegar is really just a wall, he's harder to kill than Thorgrim as they have comparable stats, but he has a silver shield for 55% missile resistance. That's all. Just an insanely hard to kill lord, sure his offence isn't terrible, being better than Thorgrim's on base stats and a nice buff can be popped to go higher. But honestly you're paying a lot for a lord that won't die, and generally speaking Dwarfs in Total War: Warhammer aren't a faction that is centred around their generals or heroes. No real wizards to throw high-impact spell effects, no mobile heroes that can exploit small gaps to flank units or hunt down supporting pieces like buffers, wizards or artillery crews. The only upshot to taking Belegar's subfaction in multiplayer is getting access the ancestor heroes who are damned hard to kill, but are also the only dwarf units that are scared of magic damage, which can sort of be a mind-games thing because the default assumption to seeing Clan Angrund picked is that ancestor heroes are on the field, so grab some magic damage to delete them, but then seeing that there are no ghost dwarfs means that the magic damage is actually a big waste considering all dwarfs have 25% Magic Resistance. - Pass.
*'''Thorek Ironbrow:'''(FLC): With the rework comes a new LL and Thorek serves this role, being the latest (and most likely last) new contender in the Lustrian Thunderdome in the Vortex Campaign, and starting at the southernmost tip of the map in Karak Zorn on Mortal Empires. He serves as a supercharged Runelord with access to a unique mount that messes quite a bit with enemy spellcasting and improved Runic Magic on his own part. In the campaign, his legendary conservativeness translates into bonusses for "traditional" Dwarfen ranged units like Quarrelers and Grudge Throwers. Not to worry though, since he starts with a Rune of Burning that makes the Catapult projectiles [[Awesome|FUCKING EXPLODE]] and dramatically increases the combat value of Quarrelers in his own Army quite significantly (arguably making them even better than Thunderers). His campaign goal revolves around finding several lost Dwarfen artifacts, which can then be used to craft powerful buffs for your whole faction. [[Derp|He also can make enemy casters explode.]] - Best Multiplayer lord pick.

==Units==
===Generic Lords===
*'''Dwarf Lord:''' No, just no, he suffers from the same issue that the legendary lords suffer from, being too slow. But wait there's more, the generic lord is easier to kill in combat, provides less army support, and does less damage. He's not even the cheapest option to help save costs. I mean he has a shield, but its only bronze. Unless you've got some kind of bet riding on a battle and there's a specific stipulation that you cannot use any other lord, screw the money because he's too crap. That said compared to generic foot lords in other factions he's quite difficult to kill, which is more advice for fighting Dwarf Lords in campaign really. PASS!
*'''Runelord:''' (DLC) Yes, yes yes. The one competitive General in multiplayer, the Runelord is just a walking bubble of passive buffs that make your low tier units good, and your good infantry units even better. Has good active abilities, like Master Rune of Oath & Steel which gives +30 armour to all dwarfs in range, or the Rune of Speed which adds 45% speed and 24 melee attack to all dwarfs in range. This is the lord pick that supports the dwarf army, and don't think he's some kind of wizard that dies when someone looks at him funny, while the melee defence is low at 40, the Runelord has the same 120 armour as the other lords, plus up to 35% missile resistance, sharing 20% of that with nearby allies. Slapping him on an Anvil of Doom gives a special ability that causes enemy casters to automatically miscast for minor damage when near him. TL;DR fucks magic, gets buffs. - Good if you want Thorek but a bit cheaper.

===Legendary Heros (Clan Angrund Only)===
All [[Clan Angrund]] has such a strong relationship with their ancestors, they come back as ghosts. like all ghosts, they have a 75% physical resistance instead of magic resistance, With magic attacks, Unbreakable, but no armor and less heath than normal. they have Fear and terror making them good at chasing the enemy off. They themselves are weak to magic attacks, but who takes that much offense magic against dwarfs anyway?

*'''King Lunn Ironhammer:''' is one of the two ghost Thanes, being the offensive one, with slightly more Melee attack than a normal thane.
*'''Halkenhaf Stonebeard:''' the other ghost Thane, being the most defensive of the par with significantly lower melee attack but a very high defense of 65 and silver shield, letting him minge with enemies for a protracted time to proc terror routs.
*'''Throni Ironbrow:''' Mostlickly to take as he is a Runesmith, so someone that needs protection while also being in the front lines.
*'''Dramar Hammerfist:''' the ghost engineer so paying extra for a harder to kill gun lines buffer and better at chasing away those that try to disrupt them.

===Heroes===
*'''Master Engineer:''' Basically a must if you're running more than 2 artillery pieces, buffs artillery, has a decent sniper rifle of his own, not great in a fight with anything beyond hound packs and light cavalry, so don't expect him to be an effective guard for the cannons he's buffing. However if there is another unit nearby casting Entrenchment right before they rout will make the unit hold the line and fight even after being routed. On campaign they also boost your army's mobility. Aaaaaand the Dwarf Rework happened, buffing him even further with the ability of the Vampirate Gunnery Wight to restore lost ammo to artillery pieces for up to five times. Just too good to miss out on if you're bringing a bunch of cannons (and who doesn't, honestly).
*'''Runesmith:''' Basically a squishier version of the Runelord, has many of the same buffs, both passive and active. With the Dwarf rework, these guys have gone from being merely decent to amazing. While utilizing a rune puts every other rune on a shared cooldown, this only applies per caster; having multiple Runesmiths allows you to stack multiple buffs simultaneously or across multiple units without having to wait out the full 60 second global cooldown. They might not necessarily be an auto-include persay, but having one or two of these guys in your army is strongly recommended.
*'''Thane:''' While they still suffer from being slow, Thanes can be used more aggressively than legendary lords. Kit them out with the Rune of Slowness to gimp enemy mobility, or give them the Ironbeard's Ring and coordinate with a source of fire damage: Flame Cannons, Dragonback Slayers, Warriors of Dragonfire Pass, basic Irondrakes, or Brimstone Gyrocopters, all of these will deal serious damage to units inside the debuff aura.

===Infantry===
*'''Miners''': The closest thing to cannon fodder in the Dwarf Roster, miners are cheap AP units. Also give "speed" and breadth to Dawi list by vanguarding.
*'''Dwarf Warriors''': Did you know that a unit of Dwarf Warriors costs 475 gold but can hold against 3 units of Empire Swordsmen, costing 400 gold each, for just over 2 minutes and racking up roughly 90-100 kills before dying/breaking? Dwarf Warriors aren't great, just good, and are very much just a shield wall frontline. Dwarf Warriors are very cost-effective starting units. They will trade positively against most infantry that are tier 1-3 excluding units with high AP values or anti-infantry buffs. Dwarf Warriors aren't the same as elite heavy infantry however, they will break in time, if rear charged, if attacked by great weapon units, if hit with leadership debuffs, or if attacked by characters. This is a unit that buys time for a unit in the second line to get in position to assist, do not assume you can just deploy them as a single line and have artillery sit safely behind them.
**'''Warriors of Dragonfire Pass'''(ROR): Slightly better warriors that deal fire damage in combat, not a guaranteed pick most of the time, but good against any faction that is vulnerable to fire, consider pairing with a Thane carrying Ironbeard's Ring to boost damage.
*'''Dwarf Warriors (Great Weapons)''': You know how Dwarf Warriors can hold frontlines for a time but need a second line unit to assist them, this is cheapest of the second line units. Regular warriors have shields, 40 Melee Defence, and charge defence against large units, Warriors with Great Weapons don't have those defences, they get armour piercing damage which is the kind of offence needed to make up for the vanilla warriors' shortcomings. Don't try and use them as a frontline unit, and replace them when you can with other melee infantry.
*'''Longbeards''': Warriors +1 really, they buff the leadership of other units (it's the generic Encourage passive so no stacking with lords), so consider mixing them with warriors. Cost-wise your mostly paying for better Melee Defence, better Leadership, the leadership aura, and Immune to Psychology compared to vanilla Warriors. A common question is which is better for cost, Longbeards or Warriors, but outside of fighting undead armies that have tons of fear/terror effects, the answer to the question is; use both. While the differences between the two units are obvious in comparison, to the player on the other side of the battlefield it doesn't matter much because a Dwarf line is still a solid formation that is hard to break. Longbeards work good in the wings to buff leadership in the flanks, and having warrior units means you can save gold for more missile units and artillery.
*'''Longbeards (Great Weapons)''': While the difference between shield Warriors and shield Longbeards isn't much, the great weapon variant favours the Longbeards, which come with Charge Defense and Armor-Piercing (but no target specialization). In MP, where every gold coin counts, if all you need is cheap AP, take the Warriors, but if you want something tankier and able to encourage your dwarfs to hold out a bit longer, take these guys.
**'''The Grumbling Guard'''(ROR): Not too bad, stat wise its a bit more armour & melee attack, 10 more leadership, and 13 more Melee Defence, which puts them at a whopping 51 Melee Defence. You don't get any improved damage output with these guys, instead you get an ability that replenishes 9% of vigour for them and nearby allies. This may not sound like much, but fatigue debuffs are crippling for units, and Dwarfs rely on grinding things out so even a small vigour buff to some units is good even if it just moves them from exhausted to very tired. But wait, this ability has infinite uses and a low cooldown so spam it away. While Hammerers do the same job but better, the Grumbling Guard are fantastic for keeping Ironbreakers in better condition than their enemies.
*'''Slayers''': Slayers are kind of weird. They're unbreakable, quick (for a Dwarf), hit hard, and do a lot of damage with no consideration to survivability. This means that they can seriously fuck up higher-tier units but on the same time are vulnerable to cannon fodder. It does not matter if you're a crappy goblin with a crappy spear, it's getting through a Slayer's hide as much as a Chosen's Daemonforged Axe. When using Slayers, hold them back so that other units, especially ones with charge defense, take the brunt of the charge before moving the slayers to counter-attack, and while it might cost you the charge bonus, having them attack through the buffer unit really improves the lifespan of your slayers (Probably much to their chagrin). Note that if you ever leave them in the open, missile units just have to imagine shooting them to wipe the unit, which is an expensive mistake. Also a definite must take against vampire counts and Tomb Kings with all their fear effects but do not ever think about using them against Vampire Pirates because they will get shot to pieces before any fear/terror units get close for the unbreakable to matter. Also, leave them at home against Wood Elves, or if you have fore-knowledge that your opponent likes horse-archer tactics.
*With the Dwarf rework that dropped together with Thorek Ironbrow, they went from terrible in Single Player to a pretty good choice for the early game, since you can now recruit them anywhere as long as your grudge meter is up. It also makes unlimited Slayer Doomstacks lead by Ungrim Ironfist a terrifying sight to behold.
**'''Dragonback Slayers'''(ROR): Slayers with better MA & MD, and they get physical resistance on top of the shield defense. The real value comes with their passive that activates in melee, it gives them fire damage, fire resistance, and applies slow debuff and the flammable trait for weakness to fire (doesn't stack if the enemy already has the flammable trait, but will stack with other effects of a different name that reduce fire resistance). The physical resist, slow debuff and the combo of fire damage and flammable debuff makes this unit a generally better pick over vanilla slayers, note that they do not get the fire resistance outside of combat so getting hit by flaming missiles outside of combat will hurt, the lore of fire spells are still subject to dwarf magic resistance though.
*'''Giant Slayers''': These are just super slayers, too costly to run a lot of. They will instantly blend light cavalry units like Marauder Horsemen or Ellyrian Reavers that dare to charge them, not that you should be using them to counter these units, it's just funny to see happen. Giant Slayers are basically Ungrim Ironfist as many Dwarfs instead of one. What they don't kill will be pretty close to death. Cannon fodder might counter slayers, but Giant Slayers dish out enough melee damage that you only need to worry about elite infantry and high mass units charging them. More vulnerable to shooting as they don't get the missile defense that Slayers get, these guys are expensive but do the job. Not recommended as a staple unit in army builds due to their cost, but good to pick if you're against monster or cavalry heavy armies.
*'''Hammerers''': Your well-armored, AP Damage dealing elite Dwarfs, not the same tank as a Longbeard but will deal serious AP damage. They've been reworked in the latest game, giving them substantially more health and magical(!) damage, meaning they're your best chance against Daemons and Treekin. **Still the same weaknesses as before, though: they're a Hammer (heh) in an Army of Anvils, so they'll mostly be pushing their way through your infantry
**Peak Gate Guard(ROR): The ultimate anti-armor unit, they go through heavily armored units like swordsmen through skavenslaves and then let other Dawi also participate in the fun.

===Ranged Infantry===
*'''Thunderers''': Like Empire handgunners, but you don't need to babysit them as much. A very useful unit even in the lategame that won't break the bank.
*'''Irondrakes:''' Where the fun begins. Ridiculously high damage output, solidly armoured. Need positioning to work right, but will absolutely demolish anything that you point them at. Their flamethrowers are considered artillery so they cannot be blocked by shields and inflict morale penalty upon anything they hit. They are surprisingly strong in melee against infantry if not deployed in a thin line because the back row can use their flamethrowers at point-blank, but not against cavalry as they'll pierce till the back row.
**'''The Skolder Guard'''(ROR): Replaces Lava for Steam to be an anti-armor unit. Much tougher than an Irondrakes with Physical resistance which is nice to have when the enemy gets a sneaky charge. They will multch full-plate units quickly given they have an even faster reload speed but watch out as you will also burn through their limited ammunition just as quickly. Against enemies with less armor you're better off using regular Irondrakes.
*'''Irondrakes (Trollhammer Torpedo)''': the Anti large version of the Irondrakes, having rocket launchers instead of Flamers. Often times Irondrakes can just melt through the armor of most things they are pointed at, sometimes they are Cavalry or monsters that have enough armor to shrug off that current of magma. Unlike regular Irondrakes they can shoot over units and obstacles. Don't be fooled by how their torpedoes explode, they don't do splash damage and should only attack infantry if you don't have anything bigger to shoot.

===Combined Infantry===
*'''Quarrellers''': Boring but practical. Like dwarf warriors, they're able to trade shots with the tier 1 ranged units of pretty much every other faction and winning because they come with shields on top of their dwarf armor. They also come with armor piercing, which makes them a budget option for shooting stuff like chaos warriors. However, they do less DPS per gold spent than similar units like empire crossbowmen and darkshards.
**As mentioned above, Thorek brings out the best in these guys, keeping them very relevant even to the late game. The shield variant is best used against missile-heavy factions like Wood Elves, but does nothing against Artillery.
*'''Quarrellers (Great Weapons)''': Similar to Quarrelers, except they give up shields in exchange for armor-piercing melee weapons. Won't win much in close combat, but they'll take down more enemies before they're overwhelmed, particularly against squishy units like harpies.
**Thorek buffs them to an insane degree to the point that when combined with all the relevant campaign bonuses, Quarrelers will become the core of your army. They're still not a frontline since they only have so many models in a unit, but 6-10 of these guys can outright delete anything that gives your Longbeards and Ironbreakers a hard time (Mammoths, stonehorns, even Rogue Idols). They also autoresolve very well, taking more losses than the shielded variant, but will take less losses than your frontline infantry.
*'''Miners (Blasting Charges)''': take that Cheap miner, then give them a single volley for bomb-throwing. Each model only gets one bomb, so make it count. Turn off ''Fire at Will'' and select the targets manually. A well-thrown Blasting Charge will decimate most charging infantry.
**'''Ekrund Miners'''(ROR): A regiment that Gets 3 Blasting Charges instead of 1. Depending on how well you managed them, that's paying less gold then recruiting 3 Blasting Charge Miners which matter very much in the gold restricted multiplayer.
*'''Ironbreakers''': The fact that Ironbreakers are one of the toughest units in the game would make them a key part of a Dawi late game army. Add to that blasting charges and you have something which can stomp most other infantry into the ground, blowing away a quarter of their hitpoints and ruining their charge before finishing off the survivors. Their only downside is that their damage in hand to hand is not that great, but that's what thunderers, slayers and artillery is for. NEVER let artillery, including artillery towers, target them. They're so slow they're target practice and they're no.1 priority as dwarfs don't have anything bigger.
**'''Norgrimlings Ironbreakers''':(ROR) Even better Ironbreakers, With bigger model size (so more bombes and unit health), a faster throwing arm, Vanguard, and Immune to Psychology. Overall a more powerful unit that can holds back the hords for longer while dealing more casualties.
*'''Rangers''': Sneaky Dwarf Quarrellers getting Vanguard and Stalk for a surprise Dwarf ambush. They have better speed to help with positioning and catching enemies at least when compared to other Dawi. They're armour is pretty good for most armies, but among Dwarfs they're on the lower end of defenses.
*'''Rangers (Great Weapons)''': Ranger equivalent of Quarrellers(Great Weapons) with one key difference; unlike the great weapon Quarreler the Rangers give up their crossbows entirely in favor of shorter ranged, higher AP throwing axes. Surprise AP flanking is a thing any Dwarf list could ask for. Keep in mind that each dwarf only carries 8 axes, so they'll run out much quicker than other rangers. Once they run out of throwing axes they become a decent anti-armour skirmishing unit, although their low defense means they need to chose their opponents carefully.
**'''Ulthar's Raiders'''(ROR) a unit your should be more careful with than just normal Rangers with Great Weapons, as they get the [[Witch Hunter]]'s ability to Mark a unit for death. You do get a fair amount of range despite having only infantry speed, being able to strip an enemy of a lot of their protection they had against ranged weapons. Good take if your using a Focus fire strategy, assuming your can keep the Raiders safe while making back their cost.
*'''Bugman's Rangers''' Surprisingly not a ROR. Improved Rangers, having the regenerative and drunkenness properties of Bugman's liquid courage. they are better at fighting off harassers while their improved shooting and HP recovery help them win archer fights. These are to Rangers as Longbeards are to Warriors: a straight upgrade assuming you can afford it. In MP, they can last longer without support and work best if you're good at micro. If not, you're probably better just leaving them at home in favor of more units of regular rangers.

===Cavalry===
Does not exist. See Slayers, Rangers and Air Units if you want something fast, you beardling.

===Artillery===
*'''Bolt Thrower:''' Your cheaper anti-large Artillery. More accurate and shoots faster than a cannon, but outclassed by them in splash and penetration power. Best used to take out elite cavalry and monsters in the early campaign.
*'''Grudge Thrower''': Your first artillery unit. Fills a role like an Empire Mortar as a long-range anti-infantry weapon giving it has the largest radius of splash damage on impact.
**'''Gob-Lobber (Grudge Thrower)(ROR)''': Like the Grudge Thrower, but better. Also has live Goblins bolted to the projectiles. Causes morale penalties to targets, which stacks with the penalty for being hit by artillery.
*'''Cannon:''' Your classic artillery. Slow to fire but harder to dodge, best used as an Anti-large weapon while also killing models in high armor units, through can have difficulties hitting if the enemy zigzags too much like most Artillery units.
*'''Organ Gun:''' An effective horse begone tool, with good armor piercing and a ton of cannon balls flying everywhere, cavalry will quickly and efficiently die off in droves as your foe rages, if there’s no cav to shoot, then this thing is good for pulping infantry and can do a decent job at eliminating chariots.
*'''Flame Cannon''' Jack-of-all-trades artillery. Great area damage to deal with blobs of infantry and while it doesn't cause AP damage, its base damage is high enough that it doesn't matter. Funny enough, its stats make it much better at breaking towers and walls than cannons.

===Air Units===
The closest thing to "cavalry". Flying Bombers. Fill a role as the fast-moving guns to shoot at enemy flanks and drop anti-infantry bombs. The rotor blades can also dish out a good amount of melee damage, but having almost no melee defense makes them relatively fragile despite having high armor. They are often safe in the air, but keep them away from other flyers and AP missiles. Despite this, they are absurdly fast having speed in the 200s to run from most problems (only Pegasus Knights or Hawk Riders could catch them without nets or debuffs). To use effectively will require some mico.

*'''Gyrobomber:''' Your dedicated bomber which sacrifices other aspects to be the best at that. As a single mobile unit dedicated to hovering over infantry to drop annihilating bombs multiple times during a game, they obviously require the most micromanagement. A well placed carpet bombing can absolutely devastate the enemy frontline, and its machine gun can put out Ratling-Gun levels of DPS on a much more mobile platform.
Important to note that on small unit scale, the gyrobombers bombs are not reduced in damage, so one gyrobomber becomes an army-shredding machine on that unit scale, and putting 2-3 or even more in every army will be an auto-win for the campaign
**'''Skyhammer(ROR)''': Drops cluster bombs, so be aware that the damage-area is greater than the marker shows. Basically the Dwarfs answer to big aoe magic to obliterate chaff and elite units alike.
*'''Gyrocopter:''' Your anti-infantry skirmishers, shooting and bombing out those enemy gunners and artillery that thought themselves safe so far in the back. Also good at harassing the harassers that thought they could run a circle around the slowly pivoting Dawi gun lines.
*'''Gyrocopter (Brimstone Gun):''' Switches from general anti-infantry to majority AP damage to harass and focus down targets with more armor. Generally speaking, superior in almost every way to regular Gyrocopters. Fire damage puts a serious dent in units with regeneration (and Wood Elves) and the lower base damage is neglible when you take AP into consideration.

==Tactics==
===Multiplayer Strategies===
Dwarfs are one of the most unique factions in the game battle wise, with an utter lack of mobility and magick, and focusing everything on tanky infantry that can deal decent damage, and powerful guns and artillery. Unfortunately for them, this uniqueness means that unless you're fighting other Dwarfs, you don't have any balanced match ups against other races. Against some you have a clear, obvious advantage and tend to stomp, and against others, they give you swirlies in the bathroom for your lunch money. This is why most competitive players think they're one of the best counterpick factions as you can avoid your bad match ups and play in a favorable situation. Anyway, here's how you can satisfy the grudge against the other races:

*'''Beastmen''': A rush faction, Beastmen will have a hell of a time against you, if you play your cards right. Their complete lack of armor leaves them quite vulnerable to Thunderer fire on the approach and Bolt Throwers can slice through Minotaurs and Cygors with relative ease. Keep a solid screen of staunch Dwarf Warriors between your ranged units and the enemy and bring (Giant) Slayers to turn the Bestigor and Centigor Herds into ground beef.

*'''Bretonnia''': The peasantry of the Bretonnians can safely be ignored (except Foot Squires, after their buffs they can actually fuck you up pretty good), as they'll struggle to do anything to your heavy armor. Instead, you'll want to focus on bringing down their armored cavalry, particularly the Grail Knights and Grail Guardians leading the charges into you. Trollhammer Irondrakes serve fantastically as a powerful Horse-B-Gone tool and your Giant Slayers can chunk through most of their cavalry so long as they're not the ones receiving the initial charge. Bolt Throwers are, again, a powerful tool to use while the Bretonnian cav is on the approach. Just make sure that you keep your flanks thoroughly secure.

*'''[[Total_War_Warhammer/Tactics/Chaos_Dwarfs| Chaos Dwarfs]]''': Here's the thing about the Dawi-Zharr: their Dwarf units are generally better than yours one-on-one but are far more expensive. You can fill the field with heavily armored and relatively cheap infantry while they have to fill it with greenskin slaves.As a result your army as a whole has better staying power than theirs. Your Thunderers in particular are much cheaper than Fireglaives and have better range than Blunderbusses. Chaos Dwarf artillery can pose a big problem as you are pretty stationary and that's what they love but your cannons get a lot more shots per unit than theirs do and if you play your cards right you can win artillery duels. Watch out for Magma Cannons however, as the burning vortex their shots leave behind can really mess up an artillery crew - focus them down first if possible. Chaos Dwarfs also have lots of big monsters and chariots which will be a problem for you just as they always are. Your best bet is to shoot them down ASAP and if all else fails have a few Slayers in reserve. Gryrobombers can do pretty good against clumped Chaos Dwarf elite infantry and have a place in this matchup.

*'''Daemons of Chaos''': Expect Khorne Furies and a mostly Slaanesh-roster. see Slaanesh's guide below on how to deal with this. The good news is that since daemons of Chaos don't have access to greater daemon lords, you 'might' be able to deal with their hero-class lords. But this is mostly a full pain matchup for you, due to the access to the Slaanesh-roster daemons have.

*'''Chaos Warriors''': For Grungni's sake, keep your distance! Chaos Warriors are as tough as you are and hit harder in melee. Stock up on Thunderers and cannons, and bring some great weapon fighters to finish them off. Slayers can help as long as you're careful to make sure the enemy can't hit back. Keep your eyes out for flanking cavalry and chariots, and pray to the gods you can shoot those heathens before they reach your lines!

*'''Dark Elves''': This is a really tricky matchup for you; Dark Elves are fast and bring absurd AP damage in melee and at a range. Your biggest advantage is your superior range and you'll need to lean on it heavily to stand a chance. Grab cannons, Grudge Throwers, Rangers, and Quarrelers and hope to Grungi you can shoot them down before they get close enough to return the favor.

*'''Dwarfs''': Hopefully you have a general idea on the strengths of this faction, you're playing as them! Anti-Armor, full stop. Organ Guns, take the Skolder Guard and bring some Hammerers to crack open your opponent's can.

*'''Empire''': The Empire can be a tricky one because they're almost as good at artillery as you are while also having good cavalry and skirmishers. You'll need to stock up on gyrobombers to disrupt their flanking cavalry and Slayers to take out their knights. Irondrakes can also work well at deleting any aggressive demigryphs or knights. Beyond that, you should double down on your strengths and keep your artillery safe; the human lines will break before yours do.

*'''Greenskins''': As satisfying as it is to bury an axe in a greenskins skull, you are better off dealing with these guys from a distance. Quarrelers and Rangers are your friends here; quantity is as important as quality when fending off a green tide. Organ Guns and Cannons will be better at dealing with monsters than your Slayers, you don't want to send unarmoured units against Arachnarok Spiders or Rogue Idols. Don't forget your Irondrakes and/or your flame cannons, they can melt down anything from goblins to stone trolls. And keep your flanks protected from chariots and pump-wagons, they can wreak havoc on your lines and just ruin your day.

*'''Grand Cathay''': This is another instance of a faction that does what you do, only a hell of a lot worse. Yeah, you won't have to worry too much about these guys when they show up. Your missile boxes beat their missile boxes, their Cav is subpar and will get eaten by Slayers, and the only AP infantry that they have is Anti Large, which you don't have. Box up, get some cannons and Quarrelers, sit back and enjoy some Bugmans as the Cathayans desperately try to figure out how the fuck they're getting into your backline. Yes they do have their own little airforce, but do you really think Umgi inventions can compete with Dawi Gyrocopters? No. If they bring Sky Junks, send some Gyrocopters after them to pick them down. This faction might get more scary as DLC comes out, but for now this should be an easy win as long as you know what you're doing.

*'''High Elves''': Don't let the War of the Beard fool you, this will be one of your hardest match ups. High Elves have a lot of things that threaten you, but the things to fear the most would be their Chariots, Mages, White Lions and <s>Sisters of Averlorn</s> (they do magic damage so their AP isn't as useful as you think). Seriously, any High Elf player who knows what they're doing is going to spam White Lions and it is going to SUCK. Your best bet is to spam either Gyrocopters or Cannons and spread the field. Force the High Elves to have to either attack your artillery emplacements one at a time, allowing your others to fire freely, or use your air power and artillery to spread them apart and pick off pockets. Hammerers also have a niche in this match up, because they beat White Lions pretty hard one-on-one and with support from guns or chaff, they can go toe to toe with Swordmasters (Though don't count on that). Of course, these plans aren't perfect. There's a 99% chance they will bring Alarielle for Tempest and heals to deal with Gyros and they have plenty of mobility to get at your cannons to give the White Lions time to get in. Sadly, this is one of those match ups where even if you bring the most optimized Anti Elgi list possible, there's still a pretty decent chance you'll lose. Avoid this match up if you can.

*'''Khorne''': It's Khorne, c'mon. Warriors of chaos with somehow even less ranged and even killier once they reach your front lines. Bring plenty of armor-piercing infantry and ranged. If you want to live, protect your artillery from Khorne's furies and calvary.

*'''Kislev''': Kislev's big weakness is that their ranged firepower is also their melee power due to hybrid units, and while this seems great at first glance, they sacrifice both elements to have the other. Your artillery and ranged firepower will dump all over Kislev, your biggest concern are War Bears and Sleds, to which you should apply Slayers. Focus down the wizards and you'll out-brutalize Kislev in good time.

*'''Lizardmen''': Lizardmen are a bit of a mixed bag. On one hand, you can scoff at all the Skinks as they ping impotently off of your armor (unless they're the Red-Crested variety). On the other, Saurus are just as stubborn as you are and will take days to chew through without good AP. Bring some Hammerers to eek out an advantage in the inevitable grindfest you'll end up in. Take advantage of the Lizardmen's dearth of ranged firepower and massacre their forces with Irondrakes and Thunderers, while your Dwarf Warriors hold their front line at bay. You have excellent anti-monster units in the form of your Giant Slayers who absolutely will butcher any big dinosaur thrown into your ranks so long as you have some chaff to help trap and soak the damage the beasties can toss about. Though Skinks will largely prove a minor nuisance at best to a majority of your forces, you will ''definitely'' want to screen your (Giant) Slayers from the Skirmishing variety. Key players to watch out for are going to be the Slann Mage-Priests, Skink Priests and Kroxigors. Slann, especially fire/high Slann and Heavens Skink Priests can wreak utter havoc upon your forces with the myriad of vortex spells they can toss out, like candy from a parade float and they should absolutely be prioritized if you find them on the field. (Sacred) Kroxigors, if fielded, are surprisingly vicious anti-infantry monsters and will bowl over a majority of the infantry they're pointed at. Giant Slayers and Trollhammer Irondrakes serve as a solid counter, but you'll still want to swamp the Kroxigors in chaff to mitigate the damage they deal in turn.

*'''Norsca''': This is an easy fight for you. All of that monster hunting anti-large equipment the Norscans bring is going to fly right over your head as you bury your axes in their unarmoured pecs. Bring plenty of Cannons and Bolt Throwers to shoot down enemy Mammoths and bring some Irondrakes to shoot down anything else. Norscans are usually unarmoured, so you can trade your Thunderers for Quarrelers for the better range. Stick to the basics and you'll do fine.

*'''Nurgle''': Holy shit, a faction that might actually be slower than you! And it seems like you will have a hefty advantage as they don't really have a lot of ways to stop your artillery. The biggest thing you will probably have to worry about is their air force, and Furies and Rotflies will be gunning for that back line. Keep some Slayers near your guns, and get ready to surround them if they try to land. After that you just got to deal with Nurgle's rush of Plaguebearers and Nurglings, and I hope you're ready for nothing to ever die ever because that's likely what is gonna happen when Dawi and Nurgle clash. On the ground, Plague Toads and Pox Riders will likely be your biggest threat with their anti-infantry, but they're also big models, so guns and Slayers should do the trick. Expect a Herald as the commander, and if he's dumb enough to bring a Great Unclean One, laugh and shoot it to pieces. With the new debuffs fire damage does to healing, it might also be wise to break out the Irondrakes and Flame Cannons -- you'll have plenty of time to lob napalm at those shambling hordes of Plaguebearers.
** CoC DLC has brought some changes with access to marked WoC units for Nurgle; the units you will definitely see in this match-up now include Nurgle-marked Chaos Knights, Nurgle-marked Chaos Chariots, Nurgle-marked Chaos Warriors/Chosen with Great Weapons and Nurgle Marauder Horsemen with throwing axes. Knights & Chariots are especially a threat, as they will survive long enough from their speed+armour+Nurgle Mark to get behind your lines and wipe artillery or rear-charge your line infantry. Great weapon Warriors/Chosen, while still vulnerable to your guns when getting to your lines, are both units that have respectable chances of beating your units in the grind with their standard WoC stats, but now plus the Nurgle Mark. The Nurgle Warshrine is a strong support piece for the army, but like a GUO its something Dwarfs can delete so easily that you really should not see it. Generally expect Nurgle armies facing you to have a decent share of Nurgle-marked Mortal units from WoC now, unless your opponent hates themselves.

*'''Ogre Kingdoms''': This match is either gonna be your easiest or your hardest, as this comes down to the skill of you, the Ogre player, and what units you brought to the table. The Ogres have massive charge bonuses, but a lot of your units have charge defense, however unlike other factions, the Ogres will only lose half due to their Ogre Charge trait. The biggest threat the Ogres bring to you is their artillery, and if you leave them be they'll reap a devasting toll on your infantry. The good news is, that with the exception of Leadbelchers, all their artillery are a single model. Have your Cannons and Gyrocopters focus them down and you are good to go, or so you would think. Besides the Gnoblars, Ogres are all monster units, which means two things. One is that your artillery and Slayers will have a field day, but two is that their shockingly fast speed means they're gonna out run you and try to outmaneuver you at every opportunity. Your army should be a good balance of Longbeards, or if you are pinching pennies, Dwarf Warriors, they all have charge defense and can help hold the charging balls of lubber back. This is one of the match up where having a ton of Slayers is a good thing, and stack up on them to defend your back lines and cut the Ogres down to size. Your artillery should consist of two, maybe three Cannons to take out artillery and thin their numbers. Irondrakes with Trollhammer Torpedoes won't be a bad call, but they're on the pricey end. Besides some of their units, bring at least two, or simply one unit of Thunderers at most, because a lot of their stuff is unarmored, your main missile troop should be Quarrelers, they're cheap and will have a good time turning Ogres into pin-cushions and are strong enough to fend off Sabertusks. Your artillerys targeting priority should look something like this: artillery units (Ironblasters first, then Leadbelchers), Stonehorns, and finally, everything else. This should be the only match up where you shouldn't bother bringing Miners with Blasting Charges. The only thing they'll have an effect on is Gnoblars and strictly that, which is a waste of cash and will earn you a grudge for being wasteful. Now get out there and strike out some grudges agaisnt the fat bastards!

*'''Skaven''': This is probably the closest we'll get to a 40k-esque matchup (you know, <strike>aside the irony of neither the [[Squats|Dwarfs]] or Skaven being in that setting</strike> [[Leagues of Votann|The Kin has declared a Grudge against the manling who wrote that]]). Between your guns and artillery and their guns and artillery, most of the damage either of you will be dealing to each other will be done from afar. A majority of the Skaven infantry is quite helpless against your frontline infantry, but you'll have a hell of a time pinning anything down with the Skavens quicker movement speeds. Grudge Throwers are going to be king against most Skaven infantry builds, while Bolt Throwers or Cannons should be fielded to snipe any Warp-Lighting Cannons, Plagueclaw Catapults or Hellpit Abominations they have downfield. Warplock Jezzails will be a priority target to focus fire down, as are Warpfire Throwers and Poison Wind Globadiers, should they start getting too close. Aside utilizing their missile units against them, Skaven have absolutely no aerial presence, meaning your Gyrocopters will have virtually free reign to gun down rats at will.

*'''Slaanesh''': A bad day for you all around. It's become apparent, that if you're unlucky enough to run into Slaanesh, you're going to want to forego ranged firepower almost entirely, Miners with Blasting Charges and Ironbreakers will trade efficiently, maybe a safety pick of Thunderers to deal with a Keeper Of Secrets, but AP on everything, Furies, Spawn and chariots will just pulverize your formations in one of the most one-sided setups in the game right now.

*'''Tomb Kings''': The good news is that Tomb Kings don't like fire, and you have fire aplenty. Brimstone Gun-equipped Gyrocoptors are your fastest fire-delivery system, but Irondrakes and Flame Cannons are useful as well. The bad news is, that you don't like chariots, and they have chariots aplenty. Use every trick you can to soften up the chariots before they hit your lines; but it's unlikely you'll be able to stop them all. Grab some Giant Slayers to finish off the ones that survive your barrage and hope it's enough to keep them down. Tomb Kings infantry is no match for you, so you should build your army against their monsters and chariots.

*'''Tzeentch''': Ooh, here is somebody that's going to hate you. Tzeentch units are squishy and their ranged units only have middling range and are better for kiting. He also has no artillery other than Soul Grinders, few big monsters outside of Lords of Change, and relies heavily on spamming spells to activate their army abilities. Bring a Runelord or Thorek on an Anvil of Doom and laugh as their casters explode. Otherwise, pound them into dust with artillery, as they have few answers to an army with better range than them. Just guard the back line against Furies and Doom Knights and don't bother with air units, they'll get shot down in short order.

*'''Vampire Coast''': The most common Vampire Coast strategy is to bunker up with a large number of cheap ranged units and heavy artillery. If that sounds familiar, it's only because it's the same thing you like to do, you're just better at it. Bring plenty of Cannons and some Slayers to deal with the enemy monsters (hint: kill the Necrofex Colossi first). Once the big monsters have been dealt with, the pirates are basically just an inferior version of you, clumps of Quarrelers and Thunderers are plenty to take down the Zombies. And remember not to bunker up too tightly; you may have magic resistance but Winds of Death will still hurt.

*'''Vampire Counts''': Virtually nothing that makes up the rank and file of the Vampire Counts will pose a significant threat to you. Skeletons and Zombies will only serve to slow down your already plodding advance and only deal any meaningful "damage" to you simply by sponging your limited ranged firepower meant for something else. The only standard units that you'll find yourself at a significant disadvantage against will be the Cairn and Hex Wraiths, given your general lack of magical damage. You'll want to engage them with missile attacks for maximum effect and make sure that you are braced for their charges. The main thing you should be focused on taking down will be the Lords and Heroes leading the army; without them, the undead hordes will quickly fall apart (literally). They also pose the single biggest threat to everything you have, as their Lore of Death casters can delete swathes of your army with a single well placed cast if you are positioned carelessly.

*'''Wood Elves''': Wood Elves are an extremely annoying foe who are fundamentally the exact opposite of you. Their infantry can run circles around yours and they can deal frightening amounts of damage against their intended targets, but you'll snap their twiggy spines if you whip 'em with your beards. In general, you're going to be engaged in a very tedious game of "keep away", where the Wood Elves are going to be dancing just outside of your reach while their Glade Guard and Waywatchers pepper you with AP arrows and occasionally test your flanks for weaknesses via Wild Rider/Great Stag Knight cycle charges. Fortunately, you do have a couple tools the elves don't: Artillery. Grudge Throwers excel against WE infantry and can discourage them from trying to camp too far away, while Bolt Throwers and Flame Cannons will make mince-meat of the cavalry/Forest Spirits that may try to break through your lines. Speaking of Forest Spirits, Irondrakes will ''incinerate'' them. Slayers also help against the bigger tree spirits in theory, but the ranged power the Wood Elves bring make them a dicey proposition. As far as their melee infantry options are concerned, the only ones that majorly threaten you are the Bladesingers; their anti-armor magical attacks will scythe through your armor will jaw-dropping speed. Use Thunderers to soften them up on the charge then use Slayers to cut them down swiftly.

===Domination===
General Tier Rank: '''F'''

You are just SO FUCKING SLOW. You opponent is going to get to the point first, no question about it and most armies have plenty of ways to roadblock you in order to stop you from getting on them. While few factions will be able to contest you in a head on charge for the midpoint, once they start going for the side points you will have no way to out contest them. Important to note that there are some maps that you won't get completely dumpstered automatically. The more choke points that are on a map, the better it is for you because then the enemy will be more forced to try to take you head on instead of just avoid direct contact with you in an attempt to cap more points. However, even then there's no way you can outmaneuver your enemy unless they fall asleep at their computer out of boredom. Don't play Dwarfs in Domination until they get some major buffs, a DLC, or rework that will help them move around the map better.

However if you still decide to stay committed to playing dwarfs, the general tip is seize two caps at least and have a squadron of gyrocopters and bombers to harass the foe, ironbreakers are king here, jam them on a point and laugh as your opponent struggles to get them off, rangers and miners are key here as they are the only units with vanguard deployment (this includes the ROR ironbreakers) to delay the foe by brawling with them as your slower units get into position or to reinforce your troops if needed, slayers are necessary here as besides gyrocopters, their the fastest thing you got, bring along 3, 4 if needed, to both delete cav or monsters too big for their britches and do aforementioned delaying tactics, for artillery, on smaller maps, organ guns and flame cannons will be an excellent infantry/cavalry begone tool for clearing out points that are infested with enemy troops, as per the norm, bring a cannon to deal with enemy artillery and snipe monsters regardless of the map size, on longer maps, the grudge-thrower will be a much better alternative for clearing out points, but organ guns and flame cannons are a good deterrent for defending points, as they’ll delete blobs, just make sure there safe from enemy cav and flyers, however the one weakness as listed above, is your slowness, you need to be smart if you want to consistently win domination as dwarfs, assume a box formation as units in said shape, turn about faster and thus let them react to threats flanking around or move to different points faster if it’s necessary (keep in mind, it does not increase movement speed, it just hastens how fast they turn), while it is vulnerable to artillery fire, your cannons should already be firing at said artillery, follow this guide somewhat well and proceed to wipe every smug grin off with an axe, show every YouTuber good or otherwise how wrong they were as you strike out grudges and get vengeance for every domination tier list that put you in F tier!

===Campaign Strategies===
*'''Karaz-A-Karak''': Karaz-A-Karak starts out with a solid base economy and a protected position, with your flanks covered by minor dwarven factions and only one Greenskin faction as your initial enemy. However, that start is deceivingly simple at first; once Grimgor and Queek get going, your position will become increasingly precarious if you're not careful. Your biggest weakness is easily your very slow growth, as the Greenskins and Skaven often will have higher tier units much sooner than you do. Making the jump from Tier 3 to 4 as soon as you can is your top priority. Once your scary lategame units arrive, you can start to dominate the Southlands and expand in any direction you damn please.
**'''Pick Gronbrimdal (Mortal Empires only)''': There is no reason to ever pick Thorgim over Grombrindal as your starting LL. Grombrindal comes with a much better selection of starting units (Gyrocopters, Irondrakes and Thunderers) and his blue skill tree might be one of the most blatantly overpowered things in the game on its own, as Grombrindals variants of the perks not just affect his army, but your entire faction. Thorgrim can be recruited later down the line regardless.
**'''Don't get bogged down''': The initial 50 turns of any campaign might just be called "get ready for Grimgor". While you can expand quickly at the start, it is ill advised (and very tempting) to stray too far from your Capital and end up with your armies battering against your starting enemies while Grimgor happily carves a path straight towards Karaz-A-Karak. Losing Karaz-A-Karak becomes a win condition in this case; if you can successfully defend it, the Greenskins are finished, if you lose it, you can restart a new campaign.

'

*Clan Angrund''' In immortal empires Belegar's difficulty level has been severely reduced, on turn one as soon as you take your first settlement you can full-confederate Karak Izor instantly. After that it's the usual hop and skip to Karak-Eight-Peaks, however with it in Skarsnik's hands now, it's significantly easier to take as Skarsnik doesn't start with a full 20 stack army unlike the 'Crooked Moon Mutineers' from Warhammer 2.
[[Category:Total Warhammer]] {{Total War Warhammer Tactics}}

Total War Warhammer/Tactics/Empire

2023-06-11T22:12:37Z

2A02:1810:4E2C:A900:DC0E:597F:F427:CBEB: /* Multiplayer Strategies */

This is the tactics page for the Total War: Warhammer version of The Empire.

==Why play The Empire?==
*Because who doesn't love the sight of normal, everyday humans beating back the supernatural through sheer force of arms?
*A difficult, but very rewarding playstlye that rewards unit cohesion and combined arms tactics.
*Guns. Lots and lots of guns.
*Because the Karl Franz memes are too god damn good to not play them at least once.
*Humanity, fuck yeah!

===Pros===
*'''Jack of all Trades''': There's not a single department anyone can say you're bad in. The Empire can be played in a variety of different ways that can be viable from gunlines to infantry brawls to skirmish tactics. No plan is off the table for The Empire.
*'''Easy to Learn''': One of the more straightforward armies out there. It doesn't have any rules or units that are too complicated, but their wide roster brings a variety of tools to the table.
*'''[[Gunpowder (Warhammer Fantasy)|Gunpowder]]''': Gunpowder units are powerful in this game and can easily swing a fight in your favor if they are allowed to do their thing. Handgunners and Cannons can make any army regret coming to the field if used well. Their artillery is amazing for its cost and can blast most things into kingdom come.
*'''Flexibility''': As explained before, The Empire can bring a variety of tactics to the table, which can make them hard to predict. They have an answer for just about every race in the game, and while they have some uphill match ups, they can get together a few lists against everyone.
*'''Cavalry''': A very strong Cavalry faction, up there with the best (which kind of detracts form the whole "Jack of all Trades" thing mentioned above) Empire Knights are amazing for their price, and Demigryphs can take on just about any other cav unit one on one and win.
*'''Powerful Legendary Lords''': The Empire has some of the best named characters in the game. Karl Franz and Volkmar can be a massive asset to any battlefield, and Gelt and Wulfhart can be used to amazing effect as well.
*'''Magic''': You have access to every generic lore of magic in the game, including Metal if you pick Gelt as your lord.
*'''Skirmishing''': Don't let all the flashy stuff the Norscans and the Dark Elves wave around fool you: You have some of the best skirmishing units in the game, if not ''the'' best. Both on foot as well as on horseback. Free Company work amazing for their cost and Outriders can be a terrifying mobile gunline when used right.

===Cons===
*'''Master of None''': The main downside of most Jack of all Trades factions. Everyone in the game outclasses you at something. Sure, your State Troops are crushing those Men-at-Arms, but you're cav just got ran over by Grail Knights. Your heavy cav chased of those Wild Riders, but now Waywatchers are putting out more value than your missiles could dream off. Yeah, your gunline and artillery are carving up the Chaos Warriors, but now that they are in melee you can kiss your frontline goodbye. You need to make up for your weaknesses when going up against certain factions.
*''' Mediocre Infantry''': your infantry isn’t bad but unlike most other factions yours isn’t really meant to win the fight, their meant for holding the line, they have average stats across the board but that is their main weakness, they can hold the line but they won’t beat the line, that job is for your artillery and cavalry.
*'''Aerial Inferiority''': Some of your lords and heroes have airborne mounts, but beyond that you got nothing in the sky.
*'''Difficult to Master''': most newer players pick Empire in multiplayer due to their relative ease of campaign in single-player, only to learn they are hard as hell in Multiplayer. The Empire is a faction that requires time and finesses to play perfectly and isn't something you can pick up and play.
*'''DLC Locked Content''': You don't have it as bad as some factions, but you do have some missing stuff you would like on the battlefield. Also, you are the only core race to never get an FLC lord, meaning if you are committed to not buying DLC, you're stuck with Franz and Gelt. (Not that they're bad choices, but more options are always good.)

==The campaign and unique mechanics (The Old World)==
The Empire pretty much fills out the entire northern part of the old world, giving you a very secure starting position with either Franz, Gelt, or Volkmar. The main routes into the Empire, except the infamous Black Fire Pass, are guarded by the Imperial forts from the south and west, and by Kislev from the north.

At the start of the game, The Empire is fractured into many independent provinces, each ruled by an Elector Count. Karl Franz, for example, is the Elector Count of Riekland and you play him as such. Each of the Elector Count factions have Fealty, which shows how loyal the individual Count is to the Empire as a whole. If their fealty reaches zero, they secede from the Empire and start a civil war; if it reaches ten, they will offer you a confederation, causing you to take direct control of their lands and existing armies. If you control the main capital of a province, you can make one of your lords the Elector Count of that province and receive a global bonus of some sort to one or more troop types, a unique passive bonus for the lord in question, and the Runefang of the province, which is an Epic item of some sort with a unique ability that ranges from amazing to useless.

The Elector Counts cannot form military alliances or confederate through normal diplomacy. Instead, the Imperial Authority and Prestige mechanics are used to represent the political power of your faction within the Empire and manage relations with the other Elector Counts. You basically want 1 Imperial Authority and 1000 Prestige at all times, and Elector Count events will give you more at the cost of money, prestige, or diplomatic relations. Prestige increases when you win battles or through events, as well through the number of controlled regions. As with Charles V, the key to ruling the Empire is giving the Elector Counts just enough independence to get themselves into trouble but not enough to cripple the Empire. Do not be in a rush to confederate them through the Imperial Authority mechanic; it builds up slowly and you'll find yourself drawn into frontier wars with powers hostile to the Empire culture instead of leaving it to the Elector Count AI to handle. The exceptions, generally speaking, would be Averland and Stirland, which have a tendency to get deleted by the Vampire Counts and thus inflict Authority losses that can snowball into civil war, the disintegration of the Empire, and mass public unrest in all your provinces. Either confederate those two provinces first, or get involved in the vampire wars and save them from extinction. Any civil war with another Elector Count is a mistake; it will cost you a great deal of Imperial Authority, especially if you actually conquer that Elector's territory and wipe them out yourself.

As is befitting for the most basic faction in the game, the Empire's economy is neither terribly bad, nor exceptionally good. There are few exploits or economic landmarks, aside from some major ports in the hands of neighboring factions, and the economic resources you would usually trade are generally in the hands of other Elector Counts at the start of your campaign, and you will either have to wait for those settlements to be taken by an enemy or fight an unprofitable civil war for them. For most of the early campaign you will be focused on fighting off rogue Greenskin armies and dealing with the Vampire Counts. Expansion opportunities are slim until you can build up some reserves; if you reconquer Marienburg you could expand into Couronne and knock out Louen Louencour early, leaving Bretonnia easy prey for your armies, but you will also be exposed to non-stop Norscan raids. If you try to conquer the Dwarfholds, expect a long, bloody, slog with a faction that should be your trading partner and buffer against the Greenskins, and if you think of heading into the Southern Realms you will find Skaven harassing you everywhere. The overall victory condition for the Empire campaign is uniting all the Elector Count provinces and defeating Archaon.

==Legendary Lords and Subfactions==
*'''[[Karl Franz]]:''' So Franz is your beatstick Legendary Lord and my lord is he good at his job. Thanks to his items he is widely considered one of the best non mage lords in the entire game. First off, Deathclaw is able to give him control of the skies and once you have it it should be what he's on for the entire game, campaign or multiplayer. Ghal Maraz also gives him +16 anti large and armor piercing, making him a damn scary monster killer, and wields the Riekland Runefang, which grants an AOE leadership and attack buff to his troops. Combine that with fear and terror and Franz can be a goddamn nightmare for a lot of factions to deal with. His only real weakness is that if your take him you're pretty much forced to being a Lore of Life mage due to how squishy he is. Aside from that, damn good choice for campaign and multiplayer.
*'''[[Balthasar Gelt]]:''' So Gelt is not only the only lord level mage you have, he's also your only access to the Lore of Metal. The Staff of Volans gives you a crazy amount of magic to play with, meaning you can get quite a few castings of Final Transmutation off in order to delete blobs. Plus, the fact that he can ride a Pegasus means he is decent at keeping himself out of trouble, though if someone gets their hands on him he's probably going to be in trouble. All in all he's a decent pick in multiplayer, especially against heavy armor or factions who love to blob, but there are just better options for you. In the campaign, he can get some crazy buffs to magic, armor, and artillery. Also memes. Lots of memes. Starts in [[Solland]] and not penalize for spreading into the mountains, so lots of non-"allied" factions to expand into.
*'''[[Volkmar the Grim]] (DLC):''' So if you want at least a semi-decent chance at winning the infantry fight, you got to bring Volkmar. On his War Altar of Sigmar, he can be a crazy powerful lord to assist your state troops. While you may see his lack of armor-piercing and wonder how the hell he's going to deal with armored troops, remember that it's his abilities that make him so good. He's got a buffed version of Shield of Faith and Soulfire meaning he can really buff up your infantry troops and deal with blobs fairly well, on half the cooldown normal Priests and Arch-Lectors have too. In the end, though, Jade Griffon is what makes him so amazing, as replenishment makes him ungodly hard to kill. Combine that with the fact that he can cast Banishment twice with no winds of magic use, and you got a buffing, blob destroying beast who can turn your infantry fights from a surefire loss to a possible win. In the campaign he's an alternative to Franz with a focuses on making a single Flagelent death stack possible.
*'''[[Boris Todbringer]] (DLC....Kinda):''' So our boy Toddy has an odd way to unlock him. You'd think he'd be the FLC choice for the Empire but no, CA did something kind of stupid. He could only be unlocked after beating the Eye for an Eye campaign you get when you buy Call of the Beastmen in game 1, and even then only in custom battles and multiplayer. Meaning you have to buy the Beastmen DLC, complete a crappy mini campaign and then you can bring Toddy to multiplayer but not make him playable on campaign. Yeah it's pretty dumb, thankfully you can find mods that only need to be used once to permanently unlock him. At least if you play the second game it's not gonna ask for the mini campaign (But he still remains unavailable as an LL choice on Mortal Empires, why CA, why). Good news is Boris is pretty good in combat. His runefang gives him passive regeneration meaning that while he doesn't do as much damage as Franz, you don't have to babysit him nearly as much. Still has terror and a good leadership and melee capabil bomb ability, so can be very good against low leadership faction.
*'''[[Markus Wulfhart]] (DLC):''' Markus is your choice if you love kite builds but are too manly to be an elf. With vanguard, stalk, nets and TWO different sniping abilities he can take a large target and burn it down pretty darn fast. Armor-piercing anti large means he like fighting factions that rely on big armored monsters, so if you're against someone who loves them, he will do wonders. His biggest problem is his lack of mount options meaning that he is pretty prone to getting gooned out and dying to any decent melee character who realizes he can't get away. He can do some great damage and help out your skirmishers with nets and buffs, but if your opponent wants him dead it's honestly not that hard for them to get him that way. His campaigns place him in [[Lustria]], where he wages a war of "colonization" against the lizardmen. As his underpowered forces escalate the conflict with the dinosaurs with [[lascannon|friken laserbeams]], your backers will ship you reinforcement to further their interests, letting Wulfhart play with late tier units very early in the game. In Vortex he is also gearing up with his fight with [[Nakai the Wanderer|Nakai]], Gathering up and leveling 4 special heroes to tip the scales in the climactic battle between two hunters.

==Units==
===Generic Lords===
*'''[[General of the Empire]]:''' Discount Melee lord. Budget Griffon rider, but most players will make room for a Karl or Boris instead.
*'''[[Arch Lector]] (DLC):''' comparison of discount Volkmar or Priest make lord. Still a good fighter and line supporter with his prayers. He rolled the lord and priest slot together so you can fill the vacant hero slot with a wizard.
*'''[[Huntsman General]] (DLC):''' Discount Wulfhart. Rather than being a powerful sniper, Huntsman is Support Lord for Gunlines. Has fire for days to inflict on Flammable and Regening enemies. Can also shoot exploding fire arrows, give units around him fire attacks and faster shooting, and an Oil attack that makes things weak(er) to fire and slows for more shooting time. Sees less use as most players need a fast-moving melee character to press the enemy and keep monsters off their weak holing lines.

===Legendary Heroes (Huntsmarshal's Expedition only)===
Markus Wulfhart gets four unique heroes to help his quest to conquer Lustria. All four start with Immortality, and three of them are totally unique to the Empire. In the campaign each of the four heroes has a quest chain that allows you to unlock new items and skills for them, much like Legendary Lords. Reaching the end of the quest chains gives each hero a unique effect to aid you in the final battle against [[Nakai the Wanderer]].

*'''Hertwig Van Hal''': An upgraded witch hunter who hates the undead with a passion, giving him bonus damage to all undead but causing diplomatic penalties with Vampire Coast factions. His quest chain gives him one of two abilities; he can either heal allied units, or temporarily make units around him unbreakable. If you plan to keep Markus and the gang together it's best to get the healing ability.
*'''Rodrik L'Anguille''': A Bretonnian paladin and the tank of Wulfharts little RPG team. He's a decent brawler but best used to protect the rest of the group with defensive abilities and high armour. Also, despite being a Bretonnian he [[fail|can't ride a horse]] and has to foot slog into battle, although he can get some speed bonuses with talents. Keep him in the front of the army, ideally with Hertwig or a life wizard nearby to keep him standing. In the campaign, Rodrik can choose between unlocking a unique sword for better offense, or doubling down on his tankieness with even more defensive abilities.
*'''Kalara''': A Wood Elf Waystalker and your premier assassin. She can venture out on her own with the deadly combination of snipe, stalk, and vanguard deployment; but she also has a few passive buffs to help allied ranged units. Keep her with some Huntsmen, or ideally the Deathjacks, for a surgical kill-team that gives enemy lords and heroes nightmares.
*'''Jorek Grimm''': A Dwarf engineer who decided to work with the Empire. He can entrench and replenish ammo for your artillary, two things the Empire cannot normally get and desperately needs. Jorek brings a bevy of inventions and items to the campaign, including a [[derp|caster item no-one in the group can use]] and even a freaking [[awesome|gyrocopter]]!, if you play [[Thorek Ironbrow]]s quest battle, he is the wazzock you smack around when hunting the big one.

===Heroes===
*'''[[Empire Captain]]:''' Your generic melee hero, and honestly he is probably the worst one in that category. No AP, anti large or infantry, no special support abilities or powers, just a dude with a sword who can't really do anything against most dedicated combat character. His pegasus makes him mobile, letting him kite around the battlefield like a human missile. He's a decent mage hunter, but if you expect him to do anything other than that in multiplayer, prepare to be disappointed. Empire Captains just aren't as strong or resilient as the melee champions of other races. In campaign, a level 40 Empire Captain is a tank and should be used as such. He'll also do a lot better with a Runefang than either a Huntsmen-General or an Arch Lector, so if you appoint either as Elector Counts you should bring a captain to use the sword.
*'''[[Witch Hunter]]:''' Your designated assassin. Has decent melee capabilities, but his main use is his armor piercing pistol which, although short range, packs a hell of a punch. Comes equipped with the Accusation ability, wherein he points at an enemy and yells at it, lowering melee defense, armor, and missile resistance. Works well in conjunction with other ranged units for when you really want one specific unit to get obliterated. His short range and lack of any kind of mount really holds him back, especially against swifter foes.
*'''[[Warrior Priest]]:''' An excellent support hero, his buffs will make every unit around him temporarily win at combat no matter who they're fighting despite the fact your lines were supposed to be one of the weakest infantry in-game. In fact buffing infantry is the most effective use for him since their staying power allows them to make the most of his buffs.
*'''[[Warhammer_Magic#Classic_Lores|Wizards]]:''' One of the strengths of The Empire is that it has a Wizard for every occasion, bar partying with Gelt.
**'''Amber Wizard:''' Unique among Empire wizards, he has access to a griffon mount. Makes your stuff better at fighting and can summon a Feral Manticore for more aerial gooning. Don't rely on him for direct-damage; those spells are unreliable at best and you'll be better off going for a different lore of magic for that.
**'''Amethyst Wizard:''' Specializes for sniping single entities and units with small unit sizes. Aim for high value targets with lots of armor/physical resistance.
**'''Jade Wizard:''' The Hippy is the team medic, Very valuable in any list <s>that has Griffons</s> that has a high value unit or two.
**'''Grey Wizard:''' Specializes in debuffing enemies and occasionally reaping clumps of enemies. The more he casts, the faster your units become.
**'''Bright Wizard:''' A DPS caster that devastates Flammable (almost anything with regen or treekin) units in addition to boosting the damage output of your own.
**'''Celestial Wizard:''' A good, all-around lore. Lots of damage spells with a handful of buff/debuff spells.
**'''Light Wizard:''' Strong lore, letting your units catch a running monster or halt a charge, and can make the difference between your infantry standing and breaking in an important protracted battle.

===Melee Units===
*'''[[Spearmen]]:''' Bare basic troops that have a charge bonus against cavalry. Cheapest of chaff but no shield. You'll see these guys alot in multiplayer, Empire tends to skimp on infantry so they can put more money into missiles/cavalry/artillery.
*'''Spearmen (Shield):''' Spearmen but with better defensive stats and an ability to tank arrows while costing a teeny bit more. Unless a chaos host will be hitting your bare-bones settlement in 2 turns and it's the only thing you can recruit locally, always get Spearmen with Shields.
**'''Eldred's Guard''' (Spearmen)(ECST) In the campaign they are spearmen with expert charge defense and anti-large damage.
*'''[[Swordsmen]]:''' Your very basic melee infantry and the epitome of average. Doesn't do well against all but the weakest of enemy fighters (Think Skavenslaves, Peasants, Zombies) and will get positively obliterated by most of the baseline troops of the WH2 factions. That being said, they work well enough for their cost and have decent morale.
**'''Sigmar's Sons''' (Swordsmen)(ROR): Unbreakable and better defensive states, making them better qualified to hold the line.
**'''Swords of Ulric''' (Swordsmen)(ECST) Swordsmen with frenzy and fear, making them better frontline damage dealers.
*'''[[Greatsword]]s:''' Your melee infantry elite. As usual, nothing all that groundbreaking and a bit frail. They were weak even in the first game and they have only gotten worse as better elite infantry arrived in later games. They have poor stats compared to other elite units and they are overpriced, a trap unit. They don’t kill well, they die easily, and they cost too much.
**'''Carroburg Greatswords''' (Greatswords)(ECST): Unbreakable Greatswords that deal magic damage, as well as an area buff increasing nearby units melee attack. Tend to get focused down a lot by the AI. The aura means bringing one of these to support your frontline is a good investment.
*'''[[Halberdier]]s''': Available fairly early on and a really good option for your frontline. Halberdiers make Bretonnians and Dragon Prince's cry, they are a very cost-effective counter against all matter of heavy cavalry that gets thrown their way. They share the same boons of Greatswords: Armour-Piercing, good model count, decent morale. Granted only 40 armor and no shield means that if the enemy has any kind of missile unit, these guys are going to say hello to Morr very quickly. Your best frontline option if you don’t need shields.
**'''Nordland Mariners''' (Halberdiers)(ECST): The marines negate charge bonus from anything they brace against. They're also aquatic, making them good in fighting in maps with a lot of water like in lustria or on the high sea. They have also have perfect vigor while above 50% health so they can handle long melee grinds better, a straight upgrade to halberders.
*'''[[Flagellant]]s (DLC):''' Your most cost-effective tarpit. While being ''extremely'' fragile, they tie down enemy units, especially those without bonuses against infantry very effectively. Generally speaking, they work better in MP than on the campaign, where Suicide units are not worth it. Combined with an Arch-Lector or Volkmar leading your army (especially the latter, who buffs their Physical Resist up to 33%), they turn into shockingly vicious chaff killers with Bretonnian levels of charge bonus and 50% Missile resist.
**'''The Tattersouls''' (Flagellants)(ROR): Even better at tying down enemy units, having both more health and bigger unit.

===Missile Infantry===
*'''[[Free Company Militia]] (DLC):''' These guys are a very good flanking and dual-purpose unit. They have no AP or much range but they make up for it by being able to fire while moving forward and being somewhat decent in melee for missile standards. This means they can defend themselves against hounds and be able to wrap around the flank, fire into the side or back, and charge if they run out of ammo. All in all a solid unit if used well. In campaigns their versatility makes the auto-resolve AI think they're far more powerful than they actually are.
**'''Stirland's Revenge''' (Free Company Militia)(ROR): come with Stalk and Immune to psychology, along with an ok amount of AP missile damage makes them fill a better ambusher role.
*'''[[Crossbowmen]]:''' your reliable shooting unit, a long-range of 160 and shots will arc over your units. Easy to use and cost-effective if facing enemies with low armor.
**'''Stir River Patrol''' (Crossbowmen)(ECST) Vanguard crossbowmen with fire damage and slowing attacks. Excellent when fighting undead and chaos monsters, dealing big damage while giving dedicated monster slayers an opportunity to catch them.
*'''[[Handgunner]]s:''' There's a reason why the Empire's described as being built on Faith, Steel, and [[Gunpowder (Warhammer Fantasy)|Gunpowder]]. While you do need micro to be effective due to their LOS firing arcs and you usually have to babysit them, Handgunners are a key part of an Empire Army as soon as they're available. These guys are excellent at melting away heavy infantry formations, and there are few things more satisfying than seeing lines of guns mow down a group of chosen. Yeah, selling your soul to the asshole gods was a great choice schmuckos!
**'''The Silver Bullets''' (Handgunners)(ROR): Handgunners with magic guns. Specialize in picking off high-value targets that rely on Physical Resistance for defense.
**'''Gunderson's Surefires''' (Handgunners)(ECST): Essentially free company who traded their pistols for full-sized handguns. They can't fire while moving, but they can vanguard deploy and do well enough in melee.
*'''[[Archer]]s (DLC):''' With a pitiful 120 range and better options on the table, the main advantage these guys have is that they're cheap as dirt and can be recruited at tier 1. Choice #1 if you want to save money and force your opponent to fight in the rain. You will get better results from other options, which have AP or move faster, but quantity has a quality all its own.
**'''Deathjacks''' (Archers)(ROR): What other archers wished they could be. They are set apart by having the powerful combo of Stalk, Snipe, and vanguard deployment, letting them be the ultimate skirmishers, constantly lowering the health of units while the opponent is not looking.
*'''[[Huntsmen]] (DLC):''' Human waywatchers only they swapped out AP for Anti Large. These guys are great at killing low armor monsters and cav and their ability to vanguard and fire while moving makes them ungodly annoying for any army that can't catch them. You're wasting shots if you put them into infantry and don't expect much against super heavily armored monsters, but they can be a pretty useful unit against the right factions.
**'''White Wolves''' (Huntsmen)(ROR): Huntsmen that don't imminently crumble when charged by light skirmishers. Your asking if your going to pay extra so a unit of Huntsmen don't immediately high tale it and probably stop participating in the battle when a unit of hounds bites them.

===Cavalry===
*'''[[Empire Knight]]s:''' Knights were decent when the first game came out, but now they are mediocre at best. Too weak and fragile to standout and outclassed by demigryphs and reiksguard. They are fairly obsolete after the early game and haven’t held up well at all. Maybe you can get some value from the special versions but basic knights aren’t really worth using in campaign.
**'''[[Knights of the Everlasting Light]]'''(Empire Knights)(ECST): Bog-standard Knights with Magic Attacks. Counters Ethereal units and Daemons and provide a melee attack debuff to enemies.
**'''[[Knights of Morr]]'''(Empire Knights)(ECST): Knights that cause Fear and Terror. Will chase way anything that isn't fearless or unbreakable. Crap.
**'''[[Stubborn Bulls]]'''(Empire Knights)(ECST): Empire Questing knights with greatswords instead of lances. High AP cavalry, they are mediocre substitute for Demigryph Knights. The downside is you have to hold the Elector Countship of Ostland, which leaves you exposed to Norscans, Skaven, and Chaos invasions.
*'''[[Reiksguard]]:''' Upgraded Knights, same strengths, same weaknesses. If you're playing MP, take normal Knights, they do the same job for cheaper.
**'''Zintler's Reiksguard'''(Reiksguard) (ROR): Has Vanguard and Immune to Psychology. Gives a little more utility than Reiksguard.
*'''[[Knights of the Blazing Sun]]''' (DLC): Bog-standard Knights with Fire Attacks and Higher DPS values. That's all that is to them. Counters Regenerating units like many undead, tree people, and trolls. Overpriced unless you have their unique building.

===Missile Cavalry===
*'''[[Outrider]]s:''' Outriders rank amongst the best skirmish units in the game, period. Their repeater rifles deliver a tremendous amount of firepower at a decent range and they are very quick on their feet (or rather, hooves). This comes at the relative downsight that, unlike Pistoliers, they cannot fire on the move or in all 360 degrees around them, making good micro a necessity. If you want to have a reference point in how to use them to their best, try playing around with Dragoons in Total War: Empire.
*'''Outriders (Grenade Launcher):''' Screw Elven missile cav, Rotting Promethean Gunners or Norscan Missile cav, ''these'' are the definitive champions of the missile cav game and the best unit across all factions in that category. Grenade Launcher Outriders outright delete high model, low armor infantry and rack up a substantial amount of kills very quickly. Unlike other gunpowder units they can fire over obstacles. Their mobility, firepower, and high price makes them prime targets so keep them safe from missile units and skirmishers like warhounds with enough movement speed to run them down.
**'''The Bordermen''' (Outriders (Grenade Launchers))(ECST): Now with higher ratio of AP damage, letting them deal significantly more damage to high armor enemies.
*'''[[Pistolier]]s:''' If Outriders are your walking gunline, Pistoliers are your dedicated harassers. Fire on the move makes chases go very one-sided, which is their only real boon, apart from being cheap. Their missiles are fairly weak, don't pierce armour and even their ammo count isn't anything that spectacular.
**'''The Noble Sons Abroad''' (Pistoliers)(ECST): Pistoliers with better melee skills and armour. They hit almost as hard as knights on the charge, but without as much AP damage.

===Monster Cavalry===
*'''[[Demigryph Knight|Demigryph Knights]]:''' Versatile monstrous shock cavalry with better survivability than normal cavalry and good armor-piercing damage. However, they are a fairly small and expensive unit that needs to be used carefully when facing factions with AP sniper fire or their own fast, anti-large units. Compares favorably to most heavy cav + monstrous cav with the exceptions of Brettonia's perfect vigor grail knights and the ogres with their even more monstrous mournfang + crusher cavalry.
*'''Demigryph Knights (Halberds):''' Slightly more expensive demigryphs with better anti-large and armor piercing. Better against elite infantry, cavalry, and monsters and generally taken over vanilla demigryphs.
**'''The Royal Altdorf Gryphites (Demigryph Knights)(ROR):''' A step up with better melee defense and terror to rout cavalry that aren't immune to psychology.

===Chariots===
*'''[[War Wagon]] (DLC):''' These things used to be a meme unit, though with the buffs they got I suppose you could make an argument for them. AP shots are nice and the additional tankiness can help them get out of some sticky situations. Plus they can function as chariots even without the AP in melee and the guys on the back can fire while in combat, so that's nice. Outriders will be better in 90% of situations, but honestly, they aren't ''absolutely'' useless.
: They do beat pistoliers and Outriders when it comes to being harassed. High armor and you loss out on potential firepower when all the unused ammunition dies with the models, so War Wagon gives you more shooting for your buck with each wagon taking a lot of punishment before one model is lost compared to how much ammunition is lost when a cavalry unit reaches that same health margin.
*'''War Wagon (Mortar) (DLC):''' Ok, so ''this'' is a meme unit. The extra mobility doesn't make up for the missing ammo and without the guns, to fire they are a hell of a lot worse in melee. Just take normal mortars, they'll do so much better and if you plop a spear unit by them they'll be defended just fine. (still, those Results can be pending) - Changes have been made to the Mortar Wagons, now not suffering from the range, damage, and ammo nerfs this unit previously had. They're still more expensive than regular mortars, so their usefulness is still dubious, although interestingly Mortar Wagons can hide in trees, if you want to conceal your artillery's position up until the last moment.
**'''The Black Lions (War Wagon):''' (ROR) Carries Helblaster Volley Guns and sometimes can shoot over infantry. As with mortar war wagons, it's better to just take the regular artillery. They might be a lot more useful in the campaign due to their instant veterancy. Slightly more useful than the above Wagon's due to it allowing you to get better Helblaster angles.

===Artillery===
*'''[[Mortar]]:''' The first artillery unit you have access to, Mortars are very powerful against blobs of lightly-armored infantry. Their slow and indirect fire means positioning the mortar is less important than ensuring they have as much time as possible to drop explosives on the enemy. While they can be effective against archers, they are very weak to direct attacks and should be kept as far back as possible. They are also fairly inaccurate; don't expect any precision, and keep them from targeting units locked in close combat with yours unless you are targeting the ground or the enemy has blobbed up a lot against a thin line of your own troops. Their best niche is probably in siege battles; lots of enemy units clustered on walls and behind gates are easy kills for them.
**'''Sootson's Guns''' (Mortar)(ECST): Deals magic damage and does not cause friendly fire, making it perfectly safe to shoot at your own units. If you can recruit more of them, and you have not yet unlocked Helstorm Rocket Batteries or want to save money, do so. They are straight-up better than standard mortars.
*'''[[Great Cannon]]:''' Good Ol' Reliable. Will blast holes in most things it hits, thanks to its high AP damage, but it can really only hit things bigger than a house. As is traditional for Total War, you can manually aim and fire the cannon to better aim your shots. Given the nature of its cannonballs, it is surprisingly powerful when fired into the flank of enemy formations, but very inefficient if they're coming straight at the cannon. Surprisingly, they shine best in sieges, able to blast enemy towers, gates, and walls into rubble far faster than mortars. You're not going to get very many of these unless you're planning to do a lot of sieges with that army or planning to fight big, slow monsters like Dread Saurians. Vargheists and Varghulfs, while theoretically good targets, are fast enough to dodge the cannon shots and close in to kill the crew.
**'''Hammer of the Witches''' (Great Cannon)(ROR): Magic cannons that deal 100 more damage per shot. Great when facing elite units with high amounts of physical resistance or ward save.
*'''[[Helblaster Volley Gun]]:''' Fairly good in the hands of a veteran player. These are basically Gatling guns, mowing down infantry and nearly impossible for monsters and cavalry to dodge, unlike cannons. However, good positioning is needed to use them to full effect, and compared to Dwarf [[Organ Gun|Organ Guns]] they have shorter range, lower AP damage, and a slightly lower rate of fire. Get the Black Lions if you can, as their mobility really helps make the best of the Helblaster.
*'''[[Helstorm Rocket Battery]]:''' The cheese stick of the Empire on the campaign map. Given how fragile your melee line is to getting bogged down by at least decent enemy fighters like Night Goblins or Skeleton Warriors, Helstorms are your answer to massive big blobs of chaff. Sporting a ludicrous range combined with nine rockets per salvo ''per piece'' makes them perfect for thinning out hordes of Greenskins, Skaven and Undead. It has got two problems though: Its accuracy is more of a lucky guess at range, where the Helstorm follows the philosophy of "if i throw enough bombs at my enemy, one will hit them", the second and far worse one is that its damage against armoured elite infantry like Chaos Warriors or Swordmasters is subpar at best.
**'''The Sunmaker''' (Helstorm Rocket Battery) (ROR) Trades lower ammunition for significantly more Fire damage. Basically a Cruise Missile that makes Skaven think twice if they should invest in Infantry.
*'''[[Luminark of Hysh]]:''' A Giant's worst nightmare, the Luminark of Hysh deals the most damage of any artillery in Total Warhammer 1. Very accurate, on par with an Amber Spear and with very mild tracking effects, but specialized for targeting single entities. These are great for sniping high-value enemy units, like Lords, Heroes, and Dragons, especially if you can pin them down in some way. The bigger the target, the easier it is to hit with the Luminark. They also have a map-wide debuff that saps their enemy's ability to recharge their Winds of Magic and give your backline an impressive 12% ward save (resistance to physical and magical damage). However, they are near useless in melee, despite being powered by a Light wizard, and cost a lot. Look after them.
**'''Templehof Luminark''' (Luminark of Hysh)(ROR): Can cast Net of Amyntok to stop any unit within range, making it an easy target.
*'''[[Steam Tank]]:''' A heavily-armored, Unbreakable vehicle with a bow-mounted cannon and a turret-mounted steam gun for 360-degree counterattacking capability. As the cannon is mounted in an armored housing, it cannot be angled to target targets below the tank, so make sure that you place the tank on the downhill slope if you put it on high ground. The steam gun itself is fairly weak but has unlimited ammo, making it useful against blobs of low-to-medium tier infantry. The tank also has melee capabilities and a good charge, so it isn't entirely useless even after it runs out of ammunition.
**'''The Emperor's Wrath''' (Steam Tank)(ECST): Has the ability to vent hot steam, preventing enemy units from engaging it for a short time and dealing a decent leadership debuff. It explodes when destroyed, taking out a chunk of whatever was attacking it.

==Tactics==

===Campaign Strategies===
General overall Empire strategy: In Campaign, the crucial thing with the Empire is having the right army composition. Usually, you gotta have the lord and 1-3 heroes, 2-4 cavalry/chariot units, 2-4 artillery units, no more than 4-6 missile infantry units, and the rest (around a third of your army) MUST be hand-to-hand infantry units. Do NOT go overboard with artillery and missile units, always have, at the very least, 6-8 melee infantry units, and use your general and melee heroes to hold back the enemy. Get this into your head: your melee infantry is your worst weakness, but it's also your backbone. Without them, all your shiny and deathly artillery will fail miserably. Your infantry is mediocre at best: low armor and hp make them die to a breeze, with bad strength they don't kill shit, and most of all, their low morale will make them run pretty soon. The combination of all these factors makes them very unreliable. More, more unreliable than you think when you begin the battle.

First of all, you need numbers: without that, you'll lose, 100% guaranteed. Even if you win a battle with only five swordsmen units and get cocky, in the next battle you'll find they're only at half strength (Empire infantry gets decimated in each battle, even victorious ones) and you'll get your ass handed to yourself. Get Halberdiers asap, their defensive nature makes them perfect for an Empire gunline (which most of the time your army will be). You also need to place them right (spears/halberdiers in the flanks to protect against cavalry, no weak points in the battle line, no exposed flanks), and you need to support the right heroes with "Hold the line" and priests with battle prayers evenly distributed in the line, cavalry in the flanks prepared to intervene when necessary, mages to buff the line/debuff the enemy. Without a reliable wall of steel in front of them, your missiles and artillery won't have enough time to do their thing, and if the enemy gets to them, not only will they stop firing, they will suffer great (perhaps irreparable) casualties, the nearby units will get demoralized, and you'll have to dedicate a lot of resources to contain the breach, weakening the rest of your line. Do NOT let your battle line get breached!

When you progress in the game, you won't have to rely so much on the h2h infantry battle line. Your griffon/horsey general/captain/priest, with all their buffs, can contain whole units by themselves, your mages can use their flying mounts to position their spells where they are truly devastating, your high-end artillery can work miracles, and demi-gryph knights can operate independently. And yet, do not delude yourself: without a good battle line, all will be for naught. Greatswords are good but not truly great (heh), do not think they are Ironbreakers or you'll pay for it. As always, even if I repeat myself, never leave home without around a third of your army being melee infantry!

About mages, remember, with Empire the name of the game is buff/debuffs. Your little guys truly need them, do not use missile and offensive magic unless you have a lot of magic reserves and will get a lot of advantage when doing it. Later in the game, when you have a good mage with lots of magic reserves, some vortexes, either moving or immobile, and things like Comet of Cassandora can be outright devastating when the massed enemy is being contained by your battle line and you cast them right in the middle of them. But even then, only do it AFTER you have buffed/debuffed the right units and have the battle more or less under control.

About pistoliers/outriders, they only shine when you have many of them, and can shoot a unit while it's occupated pursuing your other units. This is especially true with outriders, who can't move and shoot. Lonely units won't do much, but having said that, even if they only manage to get one enemy infantry unit away from the main battle when the action takes place, they have justified their cost.

About empire knights and all their variants, remember that even with all their armor they die fast in prolonged combat, or get whittled down by the enemy fire. Never let them get too far from your battle line, where their slowness (for cavalry) can make them get surrounded and destroyed by the enemy. Their primary use is to support your infantry, not to chase enemy missiles away (although they can and should do that sometimes, of course).

To sum it all up, never forget that, in this game, Empire is the closest thing to managing a real-life army: one moment of overconfidence and many lives will be lost!

===legendary lord, Immortal Empires guide===
'''Karl Franz:''' in Immortal Empires, his starting position got a hell of a lot harder, surrounded by enemies on all sides, elector counts with a death wish, and did I mention enemies on all sides?

your first goal as always is to wipe out the rebels, take Helmgart, and start building for when Grom or tree-Hitler come knocking, the next order of business, is to rescue Middenland or Stirland, Middenland tends to die first in most cases due to Festus and Khazrak, Festus in particular must die, as he often kills Hochland and the penalty's when in negative authority are HUGE, so rush up north and kill him fast, getting an arch-lector with points in untainted can be helpful with removing the large amounts of chaos corruption there will inevitably be due to those bastards, the next step is to kill the vampires, and if luck is on your side, Stirland will have at least one settlement left or gelt is helping to hold the line, buts it's still not easy, if you're really unlucky in reaching Festus and/or Khazrak, they can leave vast portions of the Empire as ruins and you'll have to put up with Kislev and others trying to settle said ruins, and good luck getting them back, as the AI is a bitch about trading settlements, you can offer them 50k gold but there's a high chance it will fail regardless, forcing you to wage war on what should be an economic ally/meatshield for all the daemons up north.

to wrap up, Karl is surrounded by enemies on all sides, the Ai is annoying as ever, counts are suicidal and the imperial authority is what ends your campaign, as the counts die left, right, and center.

well, my good man, you have your work cut out for you, may the odds be in your favor! FOR SIGMAR!

'''Balthazar gelt:'''

'''Volkmar the grim:'''

'''Markus wulfheart:'''

===Multiplayer Strategies===
The Empire is supposed to be the quintessential Jack of all Trades faction. You are good at a multitude of strategies, but you also don't overtly specialize in anything. This flexibility allows you to be one of the more unpredictable and versatile factions in the trilogy, allowing you to use all kinds of tactics from skirmishing to gun lines to infantry rushes and heavy cav builds. Sadly, while you are good at using these multitude of tactics, every faction in the game will out match you in something. Sure, you have the tools to exploit the weaknesses of others, but if you try to out skirmish the Wood Elves or out melee Chaos you shouldn't be surprised when it goes tits up for you. Contrary to what you may believe as the main human faction, this is not a beginner friendly army and needs experience and good micro to use well. Still, you have plenty of ways to take the field and destroy your enemies. FOR SIGMAR!

*'''Beastmen''': The Beastmen are going to get into melee whether you like it or not, but you can soften them up before they get there. Bring Crossbowmen and Handgunners to soften the enemy up, and some Spearmen and Halberdiers to absorb the enemies charge. If your micro game is strong you can do some good damage with Pistoliers; but Free Company Militia are to slow to keep away from the Beastmen. Bringing Toddy isn't just fluffy, he's pretty great against low leadership enemies like the Beastmen. Don't bring normal artillery unless you can keep it totally bubble-wrapped with infantry; a Steam Tank will usually work better than a couple of cannons. You should bring at least one Luminark to deal with enemy monsters, just keep it safe from flanking attacks.

*'''Bretonnia''': Your cavalry is good, but the Bretonnians will win in the cycle-charge game. Halberdiers are your best friends here; they can split knights apart with their high AP and anti-large damage. Keep some handguns and hellblasters to shoot the knights down when they break away from melee, and bring some outriders to delete the enemy elite.

*'''Daemons of Chaos''':

*'''Chaos Dwarfs''': Your best bet is to go very wide, with a lot of cheap spearmen for your frontline. Chaos Dwarf elite infantry is very expensive and they'll usually rely on a lot of "Labourer" chaff units to cover the field. Your spears will hold fine against them. You probably want to bring at least one Great Cannon or other artillery unit to keep the Dawi-Zharr. Magma Cannons are good at burning down artillery crews but your cannons get four shots to their one. For real killing power though you want to exploit your superior mobility. Bring Outriders, Knights, Demigryphs, and War Wagons. Almost all of them will do fine in melee against Wolf Raiders and can quickly reposition to try and avoid Chaos Dwarf gunlines. The best counter against you in this case is Bull centaurs but Bull Centaurs are slow for monstrous cavalry and can be easily kited by War Wagons. Leave your Handgunners at home; they're too stationary and will get blasted to pieces by the many horrifying artillery pieces the Chaos Dwarfs can roll out.

*'''Chaos Warriors''': Chaos generally don't bring their elite infantry options here as they're very vulnerable to missiles and most state troops are unarmored to start with. As such, Greatswords can be a great support tool for your frontline. Two of them can help take out most Chaos infantry aside from Chosen with support from spears. Aside from that, your options generally revolve around whether you want to pick Franz or Volkmar. If you pick Franz to deal with monsters, go for mobility. Two outriders can tear most of the Chaos army apart and you can use Empire knights to protect them from lighter maurader and hound units. Be sure to bring a life wizard to keep Franz alive. If you want Volkmar to guarantee an infantry win, a few handgunners can be brought to pick apart Shaggoths and a couple cav units and a light wizard with nets can be used to support them.

*'''Dark Elves''': This is one of the few match ups were Lance Demigryphs are better than the Halberd version. Due to the amount of range AP the Dark Elves bring the shield is super important to help keep them alive, and since Dark Elves don't rely much on heavy cav these guys are better for cycle charging infantry. Aside from that, your main issue is going to be dealing with all the mobile range. Pistoliers trade very cost effectively against Dark Elf ranged cav and Markus can help make sure they stay in place with his nets. Handgunners are also good to get rid of their scarier units like Morathi and Malekith. If you want a lord that can actually fight if needed, Volkmar is great with some heavy cav as long as you can protect your ranged pieces. Generally Dark Elves like to go on the offensive, so you're the one who will have to turtle up with an unbreakable frontline and try to pick off all of the good targets that you can.

*'''Dwarfs''': Dwarfes are the Empire turned up to eleven, which makes sense considering how much the Empire learned from the Dwarfes. Their artillery is better than yours, their infantry are stronger, and their lack of magic is made up for with their innate magic resistance. The Empire is faster, which can help, but high Dwarf leadership and melee defense means cycle-charging isn't a surefire strategy. Generally, you'll want to separate Dwarf units, especially their ranged units from their melee units, and flank the former while occupying the latter's attention with a line of disposable Greatswords and the like. Huntsmen outrange Dwarf ranged units, and can be used to good effect when skirmishing, while Outriders' high AP and speed make them very effective on larger maps. Forget Pistoliers, Archers, Swordsmen, and Spearmen; their low AP makes them useless against everything except Slayers.

*'''Empire''': As above, separate front- and backline units and take out the artillery. The Empire's variety of wizards presents a moderate challenge, requiring you to pay much more attention to positioning and movement of your ranged units if you want to get rid of them without excessive losses.

*'''Grand Cathay''':

*'''Greenskins''': Are you into kiting? If not, tough luck. Orcs just straight up walk all over your melee troops and Black Orcs and Trolls bring enough AP damage on their own to give your elite infantry a very hard time. You'll need to tarpit their slow, lubering advance long enough for your missle troops and artillery to shoot them to pieces. Helblasters and Hellstorm Rocket Batteries work wonders to thin out the green tide and Outriders can be a pain in the Greenskins arse to deal with since nothing they have is fast enough to catch them... until their ammo runs out, that is. You can also get good mileage out of Demigryphs, greenskins don't have anti-charge units and their cavalry will lose to yours.

*'''High Elves''': THe only other roster to be as generalistic as yours, and believe it or not, you actually have a sizeable advantage. For one, none of your otherwise flimsy infantry is actually that bad against HE baseline options like Rangers or Spearmen due to bigger units and higher HP. Second, your artillery can seriously ruin the day of any units the High Elves can bring. And finally, any of your options is much more cost-effective in comparison; you can bring two units of Swordsmen for the price of one unit of HE Spearmen, and even one unit of Swordsmen can handily win against them. Their elite units have "shoot me" written all over them for your artillery and missile units, a request you should oblige.

*'''Khorne''':

*'''Kislev''':

*'''Lizardmen''': Use your artillery to devastate their infantry, use your gunners to hunt down their monsters, use your infantry only as a last resort if the Lizardmen close the distance. If they have Terradons, prioritize accordingly; Riders can be ignored, FireLeech Bolas can't. If you can shut down their speedier units (like Cold One Riders, Carnosaurs or Horned Ones), your cavalry can get some solid work done through some well placed cycle charges while keeping two steps ahead of the plodding lizards. In general, you'll want to have your forces in a relatively lose formation; between the Slann, Skink Priests and various AoE abilities at their beck and call, you don't want to lose half of your frontline to a Banishment or Chain Lightning cast, something they'll be able to toss about relatively frequently.

*'''Norsca''': The traditional foe of the Empire is vulnerable to being flanked, their access to Hounds not withstanding. Cavalry can be put to good use against Norscans as they close in on your forces, though the many units equipped with big shields in their army mean you'll have to micromanage your archers and gunners in battle. Your biggest challenge will be dealing with and clearing out the Norscan's faster units before their slower infantry and monsters crash against your lines, as many of their faster units are going to be very good at dodging artillery fire, and indeed at closing on your artillery crews.

*'''Nurgle''':

*'''Ogre Kingdoms''': This should be an easy matchup if you play it right. With Huntsmen, Markus Wulfheart, Great cannons, and Luminarks combined with the Ogres' relative lack of armor and shields, they will quickly be reduced to big, chunky corpses. As long as you watch out for Gnoblar Trappers, your missile cavalry will have a field day gunning down Ogres. Consider targeting Ogre artillery with yours due to the amount of damage they can do from afar and up close. Bring an anti-large frontline, but support it when melee is joined to make winning the close fight possible.

*'''Skaven''': Weapons Teams will slaughter your infantry if you let them. Use your artillery to outrange them, and use your heroes to clear out mobs of Stormvermin and Bombardiers. Empire infantry, ranged and melee, are much better than theirs, but beware their summoning abilities lest they destroy your firing line. Empire cavalry, particularly Pistoliers, can be useful if you don't have many heroes, but large Skaven units can bog them down easily after the latest cavalry/mass changes.

*'''Slaanesh''':

*'''Tomb Kings''': Target the Tomb Kings. Everything else, bar the Sphinxes and Scorpions, are a distraction and waste of ammunition. Use your infantry to bog them down and keep firing.

*'''Vampire Coast''': As with all undead factions, you should try to take down their leader as soon as you can. Leave your unarmored footmen at home; anyone without a shield will be shot to death in short order. Bring plenty of long range firepower and at least one or two Luminarks to take down the enemy monsters (prioritize Necrofex Colossi first, then Leviathans, then everything else). Pistoliers are a good choice for this army; most of the enemy infantry units have no armour to speak of. When picking magic support there really isn't a wrong answer for this matchup, but anything with a vortex will do great against large hordes of slow-moving enemies.

*'''Tzeentch''':

*'''Vampire Counts''': Target the Vampire Lords. If you can't, avoid wasting your precious ranged units' ammunition on chaff like skeletons and zombies and focus on the high-value targets: Heroes, Corpse Carts, Wraiths, and monsters. Don't bunch up your infantry too much; Vampire lores of magic are devastating to infantry blobs. Your best strategy is getting a Fire Wizard or 3 on pegasi, as the Vampire Counts have no ranged units.

*'''Wood Elves''': Their archers will outrange your gunpowder units, but they don't have anything that can ''quite'' contest your artillery. Thin their ranks with some Mortars or Helstorm Rocket Batteries and have Shielded Spearmen or Halberdiers screen against their cavalry or larger Forest Spirits. Speaking of which, the Luminarch of Hysh does ''disgusting'' damage to any (Ancient) Treemen stumbling across the battlefield, while a Bright Wizard can make kindling of any Dryads or Tree Kin on the field. Once they get closer, light them up with all manner of firepower. A majority of their roster is unarmored and generally unshielded; they'll take heavy losses. Take a care against their elite infantry; though squishy, they are veritable blenders who will make short work of your soldiers should they make it into melee.

===Domination===

General Tier Rank: '''A'''

As a jack of all trades faction and the way domination works you can reliably 'summon in' answers to whatever your opponent does on the fly. The empires roster is decently mobile and you have lots of options to counter-act your opponents strategy wether it's calling in demigrphys if the lizardman player brings in some dinos or doubling down on artillery you have a great ability to adapt on the fly and win the match

[[Category:Total Warhammer]] {{Total War Warhammer Tactics}}

Total War Warhammer/Tactics/Empire

2023-06-11T21:11:07Z

2A02:1810:4E2C:A900:DC0E:597F:F427:CBEB: /* Legendary Heroes (Huntsmarshal's Expedition only) */

This is the tactics page for the Total War: Warhammer version of The Empire.

==Why play The Empire?==
*Because who doesn't love the sight of normal, everyday humans beating back the supernatural through sheer force of arms?
*A difficult, but very rewarding playstlye that rewards unit cohesion and combined arms tactics.
*Guns. Lots and lots of guns.
*Because the Karl Franz memes are too god damn good to not play them at least once.
*Humanity, fuck yeah!

===Pros===
*'''Jack of all Trades''': There's not a single department anyone can say you're bad in. The Empire can be played in a variety of different ways that can be viable from gunlines to infantry brawls to skirmish tactics. No plan is off the table for The Empire.
*'''Easy to Learn''': One of the more straightforward armies out there. It doesn't have any rules or units that are too complicated, but their wide roster brings a variety of tools to the table.
*'''[[Gunpowder (Warhammer Fantasy)|Gunpowder]]''': Gunpowder units are powerful in this game and can easily swing a fight in your favor if they are allowed to do their thing. Handgunners and Cannons can make any army regret coming to the field if used well. Their artillery is amazing for its cost and can blast most things into kingdom come.
*'''Flexibility''': As explained before, The Empire can bring a variety of tactics to the table, which can make them hard to predict. They have an answer for just about every race in the game, and while they have some uphill match ups, they can get together a few lists against everyone.
*'''Cavalry''': A very strong Cavalry faction, up there with the best (which kind of detracts form the whole "Jack of all Trades" thing mentioned above) Empire Knights are amazing for their price, and Demigryphs can take on just about any other cav unit one on one and win.
*'''Powerful Legendary Lords''': The Empire has some of the best named characters in the game. Karl Franz and Volkmar can be a massive asset to any battlefield, and Gelt and Wulfhart can be used to amazing effect as well.
*'''Magic''': You have access to every generic lore of magic in the game, including Metal if you pick Gelt as your lord.
*'''Skirmishing''': Don't let all the flashy stuff the Norscans and the Dark Elves wave around fool you: You have some of the best skirmishing units in the game, if not ''the'' best. Both on foot as well as on horseback. Free Company work amazing for their cost and Outriders can be a terrifying mobile gunline when used right.

===Cons===
*'''Master of None''': The main downside of most Jack of all Trades factions. Everyone in the game outclasses you at something. Sure, your State Troops are crushing those Men-at-Arms, but you're cav just got ran over by Grail Knights. Your heavy cav chased of those Wild Riders, but now Waywatchers are putting out more value than your missiles could dream off. Yeah, your gunline and artillery are carving up the Chaos Warriors, but now that they are in melee you can kiss your frontline goodbye. You need to make up for your weaknesses when going up against certain factions.
*''' Mediocre Infantry''': your infantry isn’t bad but unlike most other factions yours isn’t really meant to win the fight, their meant for holding the line, they have average stats across the board but that is their main weakness, they can hold the line but they won’t beat the line, that job is for your artillery and cavalry.
*'''Aerial Inferiority''': Some of your lords and heroes have airborne mounts, but beyond that you got nothing in the sky.
*'''Difficult to Master''': most newer players pick Empire in multiplayer due to their relative ease of campaign in single-player, only to learn they are hard as hell in Multiplayer. The Empire is a faction that requires time and finesses to play perfectly and isn't something you can pick up and play.
*'''DLC Locked Content''': You don't have it as bad as some factions, but you do have some missing stuff you would like on the battlefield. Also, you are the only core race to never get an FLC lord, meaning if you are committed to not buying DLC, you're stuck with Franz and Gelt. (Not that they're bad choices, but more options are always good.)

==The campaign and unique mechanics (The Old World)==
The Empire pretty much fills out the entire northern part of the old world, giving you a very secure starting position with either Franz, Gelt, or Volkmar. The main routes into the Empire, except the infamous Black Fire Pass, are guarded by the Imperial forts from the south and west, and by Kislev from the north.

At the start of the game, The Empire is fractured into many independent provinces, each ruled by an Elector Count. Karl Franz, for example, is the Elector Count of Riekland and you play him as such. Each of the Elector Count factions have Fealty, which shows how loyal the individual Count is to the Empire as a whole. If their fealty reaches zero, they secede from the Empire and start a civil war; if it reaches ten, they will offer you a confederation, causing you to take direct control of their lands and existing armies. If you control the main capital of a province, you can make one of your lords the Elector Count of that province and receive a global bonus of some sort to one or more troop types, a unique passive bonus for the lord in question, and the Runefang of the province, which is an Epic item of some sort with a unique ability that ranges from amazing to useless.

The Elector Counts cannot form military alliances or confederate through normal diplomacy. Instead, the Imperial Authority and Prestige mechanics are used to represent the political power of your faction within the Empire and manage relations with the other Elector Counts. You basically want 1 Imperial Authority and 1000 Prestige at all times, and Elector Count events will give you more at the cost of money, prestige, or diplomatic relations. Prestige increases when you win battles or through events, as well through the number of controlled regions. As with Charles V, the key to ruling the Empire is giving the Elector Counts just enough independence to get themselves into trouble but not enough to cripple the Empire. Do not be in a rush to confederate them through the Imperial Authority mechanic; it builds up slowly and you'll find yourself drawn into frontier wars with powers hostile to the Empire culture instead of leaving it to the Elector Count AI to handle. The exceptions, generally speaking, would be Averland and Stirland, which have a tendency to get deleted by the Vampire Counts and thus inflict Authority losses that can snowball into civil war, the disintegration of the Empire, and mass public unrest in all your provinces. Either confederate those two provinces first, or get involved in the vampire wars and save them from extinction. Any civil war with another Elector Count is a mistake; it will cost you a great deal of Imperial Authority, especially if you actually conquer that Elector's territory and wipe them out yourself.

As is befitting for the most basic faction in the game, the Empire's economy is neither terribly bad, nor exceptionally good. There are few exploits or economic landmarks, aside from some major ports in the hands of neighboring factions, and the economic resources you would usually trade are generally in the hands of other Elector Counts at the start of your campaign, and you will either have to wait for those settlements to be taken by an enemy or fight an unprofitable civil war for them. For most of the early campaign you will be focused on fighting off rogue Greenskin armies and dealing with the Vampire Counts. Expansion opportunities are slim until you can build up some reserves; if you reconquer Marienburg you could expand into Couronne and knock out Louen Louencour early, leaving Bretonnia easy prey for your armies, but you will also be exposed to non-stop Norscan raids. If you try to conquer the Dwarfholds, expect a long, bloody, slog with a faction that should be your trading partner and buffer against the Greenskins, and if you think of heading into the Southern Realms you will find Skaven harassing you everywhere. The overall victory condition for the Empire campaign is uniting all the Elector Count provinces and defeating Archaon.

==Legendary Lords and Subfactions==
*'''[[Karl Franz]]:''' So Franz is your beatstick Legendary Lord and my lord is he good at his job. Thanks to his items he is widely considered one of the best non mage lords in the entire game. First off, Deathclaw is able to give him control of the skies and once you have it it should be what he's on for the entire game, campaign or multiplayer. Ghal Maraz also gives him +16 anti large and armor piercing, making him a damn scary monster killer, and wields the Riekland Runefang, which grants an AOE leadership and attack buff to his troops. Combine that with fear and terror and Franz can be a goddamn nightmare for a lot of factions to deal with. His only real weakness is that if your take him you're pretty much forced to being a Lore of Life mage due to how squishy he is. Aside from that, damn good choice for campaign and multiplayer.
*'''[[Balthasar Gelt]]:''' So Gelt is not only the only lord level mage you have, he's also your only access to the Lore of Metal. The Staff of Volans gives you a crazy amount of magic to play with, meaning you can get quite a few castings of Final Transmutation off in order to delete blobs. Plus, the fact that he can ride a Pegasus means he is decent at keeping himself out of trouble, though if someone gets their hands on him he's probably going to be in trouble. All in all he's a decent pick in multiplayer, especially against heavy armor or factions who love to blob, but there are just better options for you. In the campaign, he can get some crazy buffs to magic, armor, and artillery. Also memes. Lots of memes. Starts in [[Solland]] and not penalize for spreading into the mountains, so lots of non-"allied" factions to expand into.
*'''[[Volkmar the Grim]] (DLC):''' So if you want at least a semi-decent chance at winning the infantry fight, you got to bring Volkmar. On his War Altar of Sigmar, he can be a crazy powerful lord to assist your state troops. While you may see his lack of armor-piercing and wonder how the hell he's going to deal with armored troops, remember that it's his abilities that make him so good. He's got a buffed version of Shield of Faith and Soulfire meaning he can really buff up your infantry troops and deal with blobs fairly well, on half the cooldown normal Priests and Arch-Lectors have too. In the end, though, Jade Griffon is what makes him so amazing, as replenishment makes him ungodly hard to kill. Combine that with the fact that he can cast Banishment twice with no winds of magic use, and you got a buffing, blob destroying beast who can turn your infantry fights from a surefire loss to a possible win. In the campaign he's an alternative to Franz with a focuses on making a single Flagelent death stack possible.
*'''[[Boris Todbringer]] (DLC....Kinda):''' So our boy Toddy has an odd way to unlock him. You'd think he'd be the FLC choice for the Empire but no, CA did something kind of stupid. He could only be unlocked after beating the Eye for an Eye campaign you get when you buy Call of the Beastmen in game 1, and even then only in custom battles and multiplayer. Meaning you have to buy the Beastmen DLC, complete a crappy mini campaign and then you can bring Toddy to multiplayer but not make him playable on campaign. Yeah it's pretty dumb, thankfully you can find mods that only need to be used once to permanently unlock him. At least if you play the second game it's not gonna ask for the mini campaign (But he still remains unavailable as an LL choice on Mortal Empires, why CA, why). Good news is Boris is pretty good in combat. His runefang gives him passive regeneration meaning that while he doesn't do as much damage as Franz, you don't have to babysit him nearly as much. Still has terror and a good leadership and melee capabil bomb ability, so can be very good against low leadership faction.
*'''[[Markus Wulfhart]] (DLC):''' Markus is your choice if you love kite builds but are too manly to be an elf. With vanguard, stalk, nets and TWO different sniping abilities he can take a large target and burn it down pretty darn fast. Armor-piercing anti large means he like fighting factions that rely on big armored monsters, so if you're against someone who loves them, he will do wonders. His biggest problem is his lack of mount options meaning that he is pretty prone to getting gooned out and dying to any decent melee character who realizes he can't get away. He can do some great damage and help out your skirmishers with nets and buffs, but if your opponent wants him dead it's honestly not that hard for them to get him that way. His campaigns place him in [[Lustria]], where he wages a war of "colonization" against the lizardmen. As his underpowered forces escalate the conflict with the dinosaurs with [[lascannon|friken laserbeams]], your backers will ship you reinforcement to further their interests, letting Wulfhart play with late tier units very early in the game. In Vortex he is also gearing up with his fight with [[Nakai the Wanderer|Nakai]], Gathering up and leveling 4 special heroes to tip the scales in the climactic battle between two hunters.

==Units==
===Generic Lords===
*'''[[General of the Empire]]:''' Discount Melee lord. Budget Griffon rider, but most players will make room for a Karl or Boris instead.
*'''[[Arch Lector]] (DLC):''' comparison of discount Volkmar or Priest make lord. Still a good fighter and line supporter with his prayers. He rolled the lord and priest slot together so you can fill the vacant hero slot with a wizard.
*'''[[Huntsman General]] (DLC):''' Discount Wulfhart. Rather than being a powerful sniper, Huntsman is Support Lord for Gunlines. Has fire for days to inflict on Flammable and Regening enemies. Can also shoot exploding fire arrows, give units around him fire attacks and faster shooting, and an Oil attack that makes things weak(er) to fire and slows for more shooting time. Sees less use as most players need a fast-moving melee character to press the enemy and keep monsters off their weak holing lines.

===Legendary Heroes (Huntsmarshal's Expedition only)===
Markus Wulfhart gets four unique heroes to help his quest to conquer Lustria. All four start with Immortality, and three of them are totally unique to the Empire. In the campaign each of the four heroes has a quest chain that allows you to unlock new items and skills for them, much like Legendary Lords. Reaching the end of the quest chains gives each hero a unique effect to aid you in the final battle against [[Nakai the Wanderer]].

*'''Hertwig Van Hal''': An upgraded witch hunter who hates the undead with a passion, giving him bonus damage to all undead but causing diplomatic penalties with Vampire Coast factions. His quest chain gives him one of two abilities; he can either heal allied units, or temporarily make units around him unbreakable. If you plan to keep Markus and the gang together it's best to get the healing ability.
*'''Rodrik L'Anguille''': A Bretonnian paladin and the tank of Wulfharts little RPG team. He's a decent brawler but best used to protect the rest of the group with defensive abilities and high armour. Also, despite being a Bretonnian he [[fail|can't ride a horse]] and has to foot slog into battle, although he can get some speed bonuses with talents. Keep him in the front of the army, ideally with Hertwig or a life wizard nearby to keep him standing. In the campaign, Rodrik can choose between unlocking a unique sword for better offense, or doubling down on his tankieness with even more defensive abilities.
*'''Kalara''': A Wood Elf Waystalker and your premier assassin. She can venture out on her own with the deadly combination of snipe, stalk, and vanguard deployment; but she also has a few passive buffs to help allied ranged units. Keep her with some Huntsmen, or ideally the Deathjacks, for a surgical kill-team that gives enemy lords and heroes nightmares.
*'''Jorek Grimm''': A Dwarf engineer who decided to work with the Empire. He can entrench and replenish ammo for your artillary, two things the Empire cannot normally get and desperately needs. Jorek brings a bevy of inventions and items to the campaign, including a [[derp|caster item no-one in the group can use]] and even a freaking [[awesome|gyrocopter]]!, if you play [[Thorek Ironbrow]]s quest battle, he is the wazzock you smack around when hunting the big one.

===Heroes===
*'''[[Empire Captain]]:''' Your generic melee hero, and honestly he is probably the worst one in that category. No AP, anti large or infantry, no special support abilities or powers, just a dude with a sword who can't really do anything against most dedicated combat character. His pegasus makes him mobile, letting him kite around the battlefield like a human missile. He's a decent mage hunter, but if you expect him to do anything other than that in multiplayer, prepare to be disappointed. Empire Captains just aren't as strong or resilient as the melee champions of other races. In campaign, a level 40 Empire Captain is a tank and should be used as such. He'll also do a lot better with a Runefang than either a Huntsmen-General or an Arch Lector, so if you appoint either as Elector Counts you should bring a captain to use the sword.
*'''[[Witch Hunter]]:''' Your designated assassin. Has decent melee capabilities, but his main use is his armor piercing pistol which, although short range, packs a hell of a punch. Comes equipped with the Accusation ability, wherein he points at an enemy and yells at it, lowering melee defense, armor, and missile resistance. Works well in conjunction with other ranged units for when you really want one specific unit to get obliterated. His short range and lack of any kind of mount really holds him back, especially against swifter foes.
*'''[[Warrior Priest]]:''' An excellent support hero, his buffs will make every unit around him temporarily win at combat no matter who they're fighting despite the fact your lines were supposed to be one of the weakest infantry in-game. In fact buffing infantry is the most effective use for him since their staying power allows them to make the most of his buffs.
*'''[[Warhammer_Magic#Classic_Lores|Wizards]]:''' One of the strengths of The Empire is that it has a Wizard for every occasion, bar partying with Gelt.
**'''Amber Wizard:''' Unique among Empire wizards, he has access to a griffon mount. Makes your stuff better at fighting and can summon a Feral Manticore for more aerial gooning. Don't rely on him for direct-damage; those spells are unreliable at best and you'll be better off going for a different lore of magic for that.
**'''Amethyst Wizard:''' Specializes for sniping single entities and units with small unit sizes. Aim for high value targets with lots of armor/physical resistance.
**'''Jade Wizard:''' The Hippy is the team medic, Very valuable in any list <s>that has Griffons</s> that has a high value unit or two.
**'''Grey Wizard:''' Specializes in debuffing enemies and occasionally reaping clumps of enemies. The more he casts, the faster your units become.
**'''Bright Wizard:''' A DPS caster that devastates Flammable (almost anything with regen or treekin) units in addition to boosting the damage output of your own.
**'''Celestial Wizard:''' A good, all-around lore. Lots of damage spells with a handful of buff/debuff spells.
**'''Light Wizard:''' Strong lore, letting your units catch a running monster or halt a charge, and can make the difference between your infantry standing and breaking in an important protracted battle.

===Melee Units===
*'''[[Spearmen]]:''' Bare basic troops that have a charge bonus against cavalry. Cheapest of chaff but no shield. You'll see these guys alot in multiplayer, Empire tends to skimp on infantry so they can put more money into missiles/cavalry/artillery.
*'''Spearmen (Shield):''' Spearmen but with better defensive stats and an ability to tank arrows while costing a teeny bit more. Unless a chaos host will be hitting your bare-bones settlement in 2 turns and it's the only thing you can recruit locally, always get Spearmen with Shields.
**'''Eldred's Guard''' (Spearmen)(ECST) In the campaign they are spearmen with expert charge defense and anti-large damage.
*'''[[Swordsmen]]:''' Your very basic melee infantry and the epitome of average. Doesn't do well against all but the weakest of enemy fighters (Think Skavenslaves, Peasants, Zombies) and will get positively obliterated by most of the baseline troops of the WH2 factions. That being said, they work well enough for their cost and have decent morale.
**'''Sigmar's Sons''' (Swordsmen)(ROR): Unbreakable and better defensive states, making them better qualified to hold the line.
**'''Swords of Ulric''' (Swordsmen)(ECST) Swordsmen with frenzy and fear, making them better frontline damage dealers.
*'''[[Greatsword]]s:''' Your melee infantry elite. As usual, nothing all that groundbreaking and a bit frail. They were weak even in the first game and they have only gotten worse as better elite infantry arrived in later games. They have poor stats compared to other elite units and they are overpriced, a trap unit. They don’t kill well, they die easily, and they cost too much.
**'''Carroburg Greatswords''' (Greatswords)(ECST): Unbreakable Greatswords that deal magic damage, as well as an area buff increasing nearby units melee attack. Tend to get focused down a lot by the AI. The aura means bringing one of these to support your frontline is a good investment.
*'''[[Halberdier]]s''': Available fairly early on and a really good option for your frontline. Halberdiers make Bretonnians and Dragon Prince's cry, they are a very cost-effective counter against all matter of heavy cavalry that gets thrown their way. They share the same boons of Greatswords: Armour-Piercing, good model count, decent morale. Granted only 40 armor and no shield means that if the enemy has any kind of missile unit, these guys are going to say hello to Morr very quickly. Your best frontline option if you don’t need shields.
**'''Nordland Mariners''' (Halberdiers)(ECST): The marines negate charge bonus from anything they brace against. They're also aquatic, making them good in fighting in maps with a lot of water like in lustria or on the high sea. They have also have perfect vigor while above 50% health so they can handle long melee grinds better, a straight upgrade to halberders.
*'''[[Flagellant]]s (DLC):''' Your most cost-effective tarpit. While being ''extremely'' fragile, they tie down enemy units, especially those without bonuses against infantry very effectively. Generally speaking, they work better in MP than on the campaign, where Suicide units are not worth it. Combined with an Arch-Lector or Volkmar leading your army (especially the latter, who buffs their Physical Resist up to 33%), they turn into shockingly vicious chaff killers with Bretonnian levels of charge bonus and 50% Missile resist.
**'''The Tattersouls''' (Flagellants)(ROR): Even better at tying down enemy units, having both more health and bigger unit.

===Missile Infantry===
*'''[[Free Company Militia]] (DLC):''' These guys are a very good flanking and dual-purpose unit. They have no AP or much range but they make up for it by being able to fire while moving forward and being somewhat decent in melee for missile standards. This means they can defend themselves against hounds and be able to wrap around the flank, fire into the side or back, and charge if they run out of ammo. All in all a solid unit if used well. In campaigns their versatility makes the auto-resolve AI think they're far more powerful than they actually are.
**'''Stirland's Revenge''' (Free Company Militia)(ROR): come with Stalk and Immune to psychology, along with an ok amount of AP missile damage makes them fill a better ambusher role.
*'''[[Crossbowmen]]:''' your reliable shooting unit, a long-range of 160 and shots will arc over your units. Easy to use and cost-effective if facing enemies with low armor.
**'''Stir River Patrol''' (Crossbowmen)(ECST) Vanguard crossbowmen with fire damage and slowing attacks. Excellent when fighting undead and chaos monsters, dealing big damage while giving dedicated monster slayers an opportunity to catch them.
*'''[[Handgunner]]s:''' There's a reason why the Empire's described as being built on Faith, Steel, and [[Gunpowder (Warhammer Fantasy)|Gunpowder]]. While you do need micro to be effective due to their LOS firing arcs and you usually have to babysit them, Handgunners are a key part of an Empire Army as soon as they're available. These guys are excellent at melting away heavy infantry formations, and there are few things more satisfying than seeing lines of guns mow down a group of chosen. Yeah, selling your soul to the asshole gods was a great choice schmuckos!
**'''The Silver Bullets''' (Handgunners)(ROR): Handgunners with magic guns. Specialize in picking off high-value targets that rely on Physical Resistance for defense.
**'''Gunderson's Surefires''' (Handgunners)(ECST): Essentially free company who traded their pistols for full-sized handguns. They can't fire while moving, but they can vanguard deploy and do well enough in melee.
*'''[[Archer]]s (DLC):''' With a pitiful 120 range and better options on the table, the main advantage these guys have is that they're cheap as dirt and can be recruited at tier 1. Choice #1 if you want to save money and force your opponent to fight in the rain. You will get better results from other options, which have AP or move faster, but quantity has a quality all its own.
**'''Deathjacks''' (Archers)(ROR): What other archers wished they could be. They are set apart by having the powerful combo of Stalk, Snipe, and vanguard deployment, letting them be the ultimate skirmishers, constantly lowering the health of units while the opponent is not looking.
*'''[[Huntsmen]] (DLC):''' Human waywatchers only they swapped out AP for Anti Large. These guys are great at killing low armor monsters and cav and their ability to vanguard and fire while moving makes them ungodly annoying for any army that can't catch them. You're wasting shots if you put them into infantry and don't expect much against super heavily armored monsters, but they can be a pretty useful unit against the right factions.
**'''White Wolves''' (Huntsmen)(ROR): Huntsmen that don't imminently crumble when charged by light skirmishers. Your asking if your going to pay extra so a unit of Huntsmen don't immediately high tale it and probably stop participating in the battle when a unit of hounds bites them.

===Cavalry===
*'''[[Empire Knight]]s:''' Knights were decent when the first game came out, but now they are mediocre at best. Too weak and fragile to standout and outclassed by demigryphs and reiksguard. They are fairly obsolete after the early game and haven’t held up well at all. Maybe you can get some value from the special versions but basic knights aren’t really worth using in campaign.
**'''[[Knights of the Everlasting Light]]'''(Empire Knights)(ECST): Bog-standard Knights with Magic Attacks. Counters Ethereal units and Daemons and provide a melee attack debuff to enemies.
**'''[[Knights of Morr]]'''(Empire Knights)(ECST): Knights that cause Fear and Terror. Will chase way anything that isn't fearless or unbreakable. Crap.
**'''[[Stubborn Bulls]]'''(Empire Knights)(ECST): Empire Questing knights with greatswords instead of lances. High AP cavalry, they are mediocre substitute for Demigryph Knights. The downside is you have to hold the Elector Countship of Ostland, which leaves you exposed to Norscans, Skaven, and Chaos invasions.
*'''[[Reiksguard]]:''' Upgraded Knights, same strengths, same weaknesses. If you're playing MP, take normal Knights, they do the same job for cheaper.
**'''Zintler's Reiksguard'''(Reiksguard) (ROR): Has Vanguard and Immune to Psychology. Gives a little more utility than Reiksguard.
*'''[[Knights of the Blazing Sun]]''' (DLC): Bog-standard Knights with Fire Attacks and Higher DPS values. That's all that is to them. Counters Regenerating units like many undead, tree people, and trolls. Overpriced unless you have their unique building.

===Missile Cavalry===
*'''[[Outrider]]s:''' Outriders rank amongst the best skirmish units in the game, period. Their repeater rifles deliver a tremendous amount of firepower at a decent range and they are very quick on their feet (or rather, hooves). This comes at the relative downsight that, unlike Pistoliers, they cannot fire on the move or in all 360 degrees around them, making good micro a necessity. If you want to have a reference point in how to use them to their best, try playing around with Dragoons in Total War: Empire.
*'''Outriders (Grenade Launcher):''' Screw Elven missile cav, Rotting Promethean Gunners or Norscan Missile cav, ''these'' are the definitive champions of the missile cav game and the best unit across all factions in that category. Grenade Launcher Outriders outright delete high model, low armor infantry and rack up a substantial amount of kills very quickly. Unlike other gunpowder units they can fire over obstacles. Their mobility, firepower, and high price makes them prime targets so keep them safe from missile units and skirmishers like warhounds with enough movement speed to run them down.
**'''The Bordermen''' (Outriders (Grenade Launchers))(ECST): Now with higher ratio of AP damage, letting them deal significantly more damage to high armor enemies.
*'''[[Pistolier]]s:''' If Outriders are your walking gunline, Pistoliers are your dedicated harassers. Fire on the move makes chases go very one-sided, which is their only real boon, apart from being cheap. Their missiles are fairly weak, don't pierce armour and even their ammo count isn't anything that spectacular.
**'''The Noble Sons Abroad''' (Pistoliers)(ECST): Pistoliers with better melee skills and armour. They hit almost as hard as knights on the charge, but without as much AP damage.

===Monster Cavalry===
*'''[[Demigryph Knight|Demigryph Knights]]:''' Versatile monstrous shock cavalry with better survivability than normal cavalry and good armor-piercing damage. However, they are a fairly small and expensive unit that needs to be used carefully when facing factions with AP sniper fire or their own fast, anti-large units. Compares favorably to most heavy cav + monstrous cav with the exceptions of Brettonia's perfect vigor grail knights and the ogres with their even more monstrous mournfang + crusher cavalry.
*'''Demigryph Knights (Halberds):''' Slightly more expensive demigryphs with better anti-large and armor piercing. Better against elite infantry, cavalry, and monsters and generally taken over vanilla demigryphs.
**'''The Royal Altdorf Gryphites (Demigryph Knights)(ROR):''' A step up with better melee defense and terror to rout cavalry that aren't immune to psychology.

===Chariots===
*'''[[War Wagon]] (DLC):''' These things used to be a meme unit, though with the buffs they got I suppose you could make an argument for them. AP shots are nice and the additional tankiness can help them get out of some sticky situations. Plus they can function as chariots even without the AP in melee and the guys on the back can fire while in combat, so that's nice. Outriders will be better in 90% of situations, but honestly, they aren't ''absolutely'' useless.
: They do beat pistoliers and Outriders when it comes to being harassed. High armor and you loss out on potential firepower when all the unused ammunition dies with the models, so War Wagon gives you more shooting for your buck with each wagon taking a lot of punishment before one model is lost compared to how much ammunition is lost when a cavalry unit reaches that same health margin.
*'''War Wagon (Mortar) (DLC):''' Ok, so ''this'' is a meme unit. The extra mobility doesn't make up for the missing ammo and without the guns, to fire they are a hell of a lot worse in melee. Just take normal mortars, they'll do so much better and if you plop a spear unit by them they'll be defended just fine. (still, those Results can be pending) - Changes have been made to the Mortar Wagons, now not suffering from the range, damage, and ammo nerfs this unit previously had. They're still more expensive than regular mortars, so their usefulness is still dubious, although interestingly Mortar Wagons can hide in trees, if you want to conceal your artillery's position up until the last moment.
**'''The Black Lions (War Wagon):''' (ROR) Carries Helblaster Volley Guns and sometimes can shoot over infantry. As with mortar war wagons, it's better to just take the regular artillery. They might be a lot more useful in the campaign due to their instant veterancy. Slightly more useful than the above Wagon's due to it allowing you to get better Helblaster angles.

===Artillery===
*'''[[Mortar]]:''' The first artillery unit you have access to, Mortars are very powerful against blobs of lightly-armored infantry. Their slow and indirect fire means positioning the mortar is less important than ensuring they have as much time as possible to drop explosives on the enemy. While they can be effective against archers, they are very weak to direct attacks and should be kept as far back as possible. They are also fairly inaccurate; don't expect any precision, and keep them from targeting units locked in close combat with yours unless you are targeting the ground or the enemy has blobbed up a lot against a thin line of your own troops. Their best niche is probably in siege battles; lots of enemy units clustered on walls and behind gates are easy kills for them.
**'''Sootson's Guns''' (Mortar)(ECST): Deals magic damage and does not cause friendly fire, making it perfectly safe to shoot at your own units. If you can recruit more of them, and you have not yet unlocked Helstorm Rocket Batteries or want to save money, do so. They are straight-up better than standard mortars.
*'''[[Great Cannon]]:''' Good Ol' Reliable. Will blast holes in most things it hits, thanks to its high AP damage, but it can really only hit things bigger than a house. As is traditional for Total War, you can manually aim and fire the cannon to better aim your shots. Given the nature of its cannonballs, it is surprisingly powerful when fired into the flank of enemy formations, but very inefficient if they're coming straight at the cannon. Surprisingly, they shine best in sieges, able to blast enemy towers, gates, and walls into rubble far faster than mortars. You're not going to get very many of these unless you're planning to do a lot of sieges with that army or planning to fight big, slow monsters like Dread Saurians. Vargheists and Varghulfs, while theoretically good targets, are fast enough to dodge the cannon shots and close in to kill the crew.
**'''Hammer of the Witches''' (Great Cannon)(ROR): Magic cannons that deal 100 more damage per shot. Great when facing elite units with high amounts of physical resistance or ward save.
*'''[[Helblaster Volley Gun]]:''' Fairly good in the hands of a veteran player. These are basically Gatling guns, mowing down infantry and nearly impossible for monsters and cavalry to dodge, unlike cannons. However, good positioning is needed to use them to full effect, and compared to Dwarf [[Organ Gun|Organ Guns]] they have shorter range, lower AP damage, and a slightly lower rate of fire. Get the Black Lions if you can, as their mobility really helps make the best of the Helblaster.
*'''[[Helstorm Rocket Battery]]:''' The cheese stick of the Empire on the campaign map. Given how fragile your melee line is to getting bogged down by at least decent enemy fighters like Night Goblins or Skeleton Warriors, Helstorms are your answer to massive big blobs of chaff. Sporting a ludicrous range combined with nine rockets per salvo ''per piece'' makes them perfect for thinning out hordes of Greenskins, Skaven and Undead. It has got two problems though: Its accuracy is more of a lucky guess at range, where the Helstorm follows the philosophy of "if i throw enough bombs at my enemy, one will hit them", the second and far worse one is that its damage against armoured elite infantry like Chaos Warriors or Swordmasters is subpar at best.
**'''The Sunmaker''' (Helstorm Rocket Battery) (ROR) Trades lower ammunition for significantly more Fire damage. Basically a Cruise Missile that makes Skaven think twice if they should invest in Infantry.
*'''[[Luminark of Hysh]]:''' A Giant's worst nightmare, the Luminark of Hysh deals the most damage of any artillery in Total Warhammer 1. Very accurate, on par with an Amber Spear and with very mild tracking effects, but specialized for targeting single entities. These are great for sniping high-value enemy units, like Lords, Heroes, and Dragons, especially if you can pin them down in some way. The bigger the target, the easier it is to hit with the Luminark. They also have a map-wide debuff that saps their enemy's ability to recharge their Winds of Magic and give your backline an impressive 12% ward save (resistance to physical and magical damage). However, they are near useless in melee, despite being powered by a Light wizard, and cost a lot. Look after them.
**'''Templehof Luminark''' (Luminark of Hysh)(ROR): Can cast Net of Amyntok to stop any unit within range, making it an easy target.
*'''[[Steam Tank]]:''' A heavily-armored, Unbreakable vehicle with a bow-mounted cannon and a turret-mounted steam gun for 360-degree counterattacking capability. As the cannon is mounted in an armored housing, it cannot be angled to target targets below the tank, so make sure that you place the tank on the downhill slope if you put it on high ground. The steam gun itself is fairly weak but has unlimited ammo, making it useful against blobs of low-to-medium tier infantry. The tank also has melee capabilities and a good charge, so it isn't entirely useless even after it runs out of ammunition.
**'''The Emperor's Wrath''' (Steam Tank)(ECST): Has the ability to vent hot steam, preventing enemy units from engaging it for a short time and dealing a decent leadership debuff. It explodes when destroyed, taking out a chunk of whatever was attacking it.

==Tactics==

===Campaign Strategies===
General overall Empire strategy: In Campaign, the crucial thing with the Empire is having the right army composition. Usually, you gotta have the lord and 1-3 heroes, 2-4 cavalry/chariot units, 2-4 artillery units, no more than 4-6 missile infantry units, and the rest (around a third of your army) MUST be hand-to-hand infantry units. Do NOT go overboard with artillery and missile units, always have, at the very least, 6-8 melee infantry units, and use your general and melee heroes to hold back the enemy. Get this into your head: your melee infantry is your worst weakness, but it's also your backbone. Without them, all your shiny and deathly artillery will fail miserably. Your infantry is mediocre at best: low armor and hp make them die to a breeze, with bad strength they don't kill shit, and most of all, their low morale will make them run pretty soon. The combination of all these factors makes them very unreliable. More, more unreliable than you think when you begin the battle.

First of all, you need numbers: without that, you'll lose, 100% guaranteed. Even if you win a battle with only five swordsmen units and get cocky, in the next battle you'll find they're only at half strength (Empire infantry gets decimated in each battle, even victorious ones) and you'll get your ass handed to yourself. Get Halberdiers asap, their defensive nature makes them perfect for an Empire gunline (which most of the time your army will be). You also need to place them right (spears/halberdiers in the flanks to protect against cavalry, no weak points in the battle line, no exposed flanks), and you need to support the right heroes with "Hold the line" and priests with battle prayers evenly distributed in the line, cavalry in the flanks prepared to intervene when necessary, mages to buff the line/debuff the enemy. Without a reliable wall of steel in front of them, your missiles and artillery won't have enough time to do their thing, and if the enemy gets to them, not only will they stop firing, they will suffer great (perhaps irreparable) casualties, the nearby units will get demoralized, and you'll have to dedicate a lot of resources to contain the breach, weakening the rest of your line. Do NOT let your battle line get breached!

When you progress in the game, you won't have to rely so much on the h2h infantry battle line. Your griffon/horsey general/captain/priest, with all their buffs, can contain whole units by themselves, your mages can use their flying mounts to position their spells where they are truly devastating, your high-end artillery can work miracles, and demi-gryph knights can operate independently. And yet, do not delude yourself: without a good battle line, all will be for naught. Greatswords are good but not truly great (heh), do not think they are Ironbreakers or you'll pay for it. As always, even if I repeat myself, never leave home without around a third of your army being melee infantry!

About mages, remember, with Empire the name of the game is buff/debuffs. Your little guys truly need them, do not use missile and offensive magic unless you have a lot of magic reserves and will get a lot of advantage when doing it. Later in the game, when you have a good mage with lots of magic reserves, some vortexes, either moving or immobile, and things like Comet of Cassandora can be outright devastating when the massed enemy is being contained by your battle line and you cast them right in the middle of them. But even then, only do it AFTER you have buffed/debuffed the right units and have the battle more or less under control.

About pistoliers/outriders, they only shine when you have many of them, and can shoot a unit while it's occupated pursuing your other units. This is especially true with outriders, who can't move and shoot. Lonely units won't do much, but having said that, even if they only manage to get one enemy infantry unit away from the main battle when the action takes place, they have justified their cost.

About empire knights and all their variants, remember that even with all their armor they die fast in prolonged combat, or get whittled down by the enemy fire. Never let them get too far from your battle line, where their slowness (for cavalry) can make them get surrounded and destroyed by the enemy. Their primary use is to support your infantry, not to chase enemy missiles away (although they can and should do that sometimes, of course).

To sum it all up, never forget that, in this game, Empire is the closest thing to managing a real-life army: one moment of overconfidence and many lives will be lost!

===legendary lord, Immortal Empires guide===
'''Karl Franz:''' in Immortal Empires, his starting position got a hell of a lot harder, surrounded by enemies on all sides, elector counts with a death wish, and did I mention enemies on all sides?

your first goal as always is to wipe out the rebels, take Helmgart, and start building for when Grom or tree-Hitler come knocking, the next order of business, is to rescue Middenland or Stirland, Middenland tends to die first in most cases due to Festus and Khazrak, Festus in particular must die, as he often kills Hochland and the penalty's when in negative authority are HUGE, so rush up north and kill him fast, getting an arch-lector with points in untainted can be helpful with removing the large amounts of chaos corruption there will inevitably be due to those bastards, the next step is to kill the vampires, and if luck is on your side, Stirland will have at least one settlement left or gelt is helping to hold the line, buts it's still not easy, if you're really unlucky in reaching Festus and/or Khazrak, they can leave vast portions of the Empire as ruins and you'll have to put up with Kislev and others trying to settle said ruins, and good luck getting them back, as the AI is a bitch about trading settlements, you can offer them 50k gold but there's a high chance it will fail regardless, forcing you to wage war on what should be an economic ally/meatshield for all the daemons up north.

to wrap up, Karl is surrounded by enemies on all sides, the Ai is annoying as ever, counts are suicidal and the imperial authority is what ends your campaign, as the counts die left, right, and center.

well, my good man, you have your work cut out for you, may the odds be in your favor! FOR SIGMAR!

'''Balthazar gelt:'''

'''Volkmar the grim:'''

'''Markus wulfheart:'''

===Multiplayer Strategies===
The Empire is supposed to be the quintessential Jack of all Trades faction. You are good at a multitude of strategies, but you also don't overtly specialize in anything. This flexibility allows you to be one of the more unpredictable and versatile factions in the trilogy, allowing you to use all kinds of tactics from skirmishing to gun lines to infantry rushes and heavy cav builds. Sadly, while you are good at using these multitude of tactics, every faction in the game will out match you in something. Sure, you have the tools to exploit the weaknesses of others, but if you try to out skirmish the Wood Elves or out melee Chaos you shouldn't be surprised when it goes tits up for you. Contrary to what you may believe as the main human faction, this is not a beginner friendly army and needs experience and good micro to use well. Still, you have plenty of ways to take the field and destroy your enemies. FOR SIGMAR!

*'''Beastmen''': The Beastmen are going to get into melee whether you like it or not, but you can soften them up before they get there. Bring Crossbowmen and Handgunners to soften the enemy up, and some Spearmen and Halberdiers to absorb the enemies charge. If your micro game is strong you can do some good damage with Pistoliers; but Free Company Militia are to slow to keep away from the Beastmen. Bringing Toddy isn't just fluffy, he's pretty great against low leadership enemies like the Beastmen. Don't bring normal artillery unless you can keep it totally bubble-wrapped with infantry; a Steam Tank will usually work better than a couple of cannons. You should bring at least one Luminark to deal with enemy monsters, just keep it safe from flanking attacks.

*'''Bretonnia''': Your cavalry is good, but the Bretonnians will win in the cycle-charge game. Halberdiers are your best friends here; they can split knights apart with their high AP and anti-large damage. Keep some handguns and hellblasters to shoot the knights down when they break away from melee, and bring some outriders to delete the enemy elite.

*'''Daemons of Chaos''':

*'''Chaos Dwarfs''': Your best bet is to go very wide, with a lot of cheap spearmen for your frontline. Chaos Dwarf elite infantry is very expensive and they'll usually rely on a lot of "Labourer" chaff units to cover the field. Your spears will hold fine against them. You probably want to bring at least one Great Cannon or other artillery unit to keep the Dawi-Zharr. Magma Cannons are good at burning down artillery crews but your cannons get four shots to their one. For real killing power though you want to exploit your superior mobility. Bring Outriders, Knights, Demigryphs, and War Wagons. Almost all of them will do fine in melee against Wolf Raiders and can quickly reposition to try and avoid Chaos Dwarf gunlines. The best counter against you in this case is Bull centaurs but Bull Centaurs are slow for monstrous cavalry and can be easily kited by War Wagons. Leave your Handgunners at home; they're too stationary and will get blasted to pieces by the many horrifying artillery pieces the Chaos Dwarfs can roll out.

*'''Chaos Warriors''': Chaos generally don't bring their elite infantry options here as they're very vulnerable to missiles and most state troops are unarmored to start with. As such, Greatswords can be a great support tool for your frontline. Two of them can help take out most Chaos infantry aside from Chosen with support from spears. Aside from that, your options generally revolve around whether you want to pick Franz or Volkmar. If you pick Franz to deal with monsters, go for mobility. Two outriders can tear most of the Chaos army apart and you can use Empire knights to protect them from lighter maurader and hound units. Be sure to bring a life wizard to keep Franz alive. If you want Volkmar to guarantee an infantry win, a few handgunners can be brought to pick apart Shaggoths and a couple cav units and a light wizard with nets can be used to support them.

*'''Dark Elves''': This is one of the few match ups were Lance Demigryphs are better than the Halberd version. Due to the amount of range AP the Dark Elves bring the shield is super important to help keep them alive, and since Dark Elves don't rely much on heavy cav these guys are better for cycle charging infantry. Aside from that, your main issue is going to be dealing with all the mobile range. Pistolers trade very cost effectively against Dark Elf ranged cav and Markus can help make sure they stay in place with his nets. Handgunners are also good to get rid of their scarier units like Morathi and Malekith. If you want a lord that can actually fight if needed, Volkmar is great with some heavy cav as long as you can protect your ranged pieces. Generally Dark Elves like to go on the offensive, so you're the one who will have to turtle up with an unbreakable frontline and try to pick off all of the good targets that you can.

*'''Dwarfs''': Dwarves are the Empire turned up to eleven, which makes sense considering how much the Empire learned from the dwarves. Their artillery is better than yours, their infantry are stronger, and their lack of magic is made up for with their innate magic resistance. The Empire is faster, which can help, but high Dwarf leadership and melee defense means cycle-charging isn't a surefire strategy. Generally, you'll want to separate dwarf units, especially their ranged units from their melee units, and flank the former while occupying the latter's attention with a line of disposable Greatswords and the like. Huntsmen outrange dwarf ranged units, and can be used to good effect when skirmishing, while Outriders' high AP and speed make them very effective on larger maps. Forget Pistoliers, Archers, Swordsmen, and Spearmen; their low AP makes them useless against everything except Slayers.

*'''Empire''': As above, separate front- and backline units and take out the artillery. The Empire's variety of wizards presents a moderate challenge, requiring you to pay much more attention to positioning and movement of your ranged units if you want to get rid of them without excessive losses.

*'''Grand Cathay''':

*'''Greenskins''': Are you into kiting? If not, tough luck. Orcs just straight up walk all over your melee troops and Black Orcs and Trolls bring enough AP damage on their own to give your elite infantry a very hard time. You'll need to tarpit their slow, lubering advance long enough for your missle troops and artillery to shoot them to pieces. Helblasters and Hellstorm Rocket Batteries work wonders to thin out the green tide and Outriders can be a pain in the Greenskins arse to deal with since nothing they have is fast enough to catch them... until their ammo runs out, that is. You can also get good mileage out of Demigryphs, greenskins don't have anti-charge units and their cavalry will lose to yours.

*'''High Elves''': THe only other roster to be as generalistic as yours, and believe it or not, you actually have a sizeable advantage. For one, none of your otherwise flimsy infantry is actually that bad against HE baseline options like Rangers or Spearmen due to bigger units and higher HP. Second, your artillery can seriously ruin the day of any units the High Elves can bring. And finally, any of your options is much more cost-effective in comparison; you can bring two units of Swordsmen for the price of one unit of HE Spearmen, and even one unit of Swordsmen can handily win against them. Their elite units have "shoot me" written all over them for your artillery and missile units, a request you should oblige.

*'''Khorne''':

*'''Kislev''':

*'''Lizardmen''': Use your artillery to devastate their infantry, use your gunners to hunt down their monsters, use your infantry only as a last resort if the Lizardmen close the distance. If they have Terradons, prioritize accordingly; Riders can be ignored, FireLeech Bolas can't. If you can shut down their speedier units (like Cold One Riders, Carnosaurs or Horned Ones), your cavalry can get some solid work done through some well placed cycle charges while keeping two steps ahead of the plodding lizards. In general, you'll want to have your forces in a relatively lose formation; between the Slann, Skink Priests and various AoE abilities at their beck and call, you don't want to lose half of your frontline to a Banishment or Chain Lightning cast, something they'll be able to toss about relatively frequently.

*'''Norsca''': The traditional foe of the Empire is vulnerable to being flanked, their access to Hounds not withstanding. Cavalry can be put to good use against Norscans as they close in on your forces, though the many units equipped with big shields in their army mean you'll have to micromanage your archers and gunners in battle. Your biggest challenge will be dealing with and clearing out the Norscan's faster units before their slower infantry and monsters crash against your lines, as many of their faster units are going to be very good at dodging artillery fire, and indeed at closing on your artillery crews.

*'''Nurgle''':

*'''Ogre Kingdoms''': This should be an easy matchup if you play it right. With Huntsmen, Markus Wulfheart, Great cannons, and Luminarks combined with the Ogres' relative lack of armor and shields, they will quickly be reduced to big, chunky corpses. As long as you watch out for Gnoblar Trappers, your missile cavalry will have a field day gunning down Ogres. Consider targeting Ogre artillery with yours due to the amount of damage they can do from afar and up close. Bring an anti-large frontline, but support it when melee is joined to make winning the close fight possible.

*'''Skaven''': Weapons Teams will slaughter your infantry if you let them. Use your artillery to outrange them, and use your heroes to clear out mobs of Stormvermin and Bombardiers. Empire infantry, ranged and melee, are much better than theirs, but beware their summoning abilities lest they destroy your firing line. Empire cavalry, particularly Pistoliers, can be useful if you don't have many heroes, but large Skaven units can bog them down easily after the latest cavalry/mass changes.

*'''Slaanesh''':

*'''Tomb Kings''': Target the Tomb Kings. Everything else, bar the Sphinxes and Scorpions, are a distraction and waste of ammunition. Use your infantry to bog them down and keep firing.

*'''Vampire Coast''': As with all undead factions, you should try to take down their leader as soon as you can. Leave your unarmored footmen at home; anyone without a shield will be shot to death in short order. Bring plenty of long range firepower and at least one or two Luminarks to take down the enemy monsters (prioritize Necrofex Colossi first, then Leviathans, then everything else). Pistoliers are a good choice for this army; most of the enemy infantry units have no armour to speak of. When picking magic support there really isn't a wrong answer for this matchup, but anything with a vortex will do great against large hordes of slow-moving enemies.

*'''Tzeentch''':

*'''Vampire Counts''': Target the Vampire Lords. If you can't, avoid wasting your precious ranged units' ammunition on chaff like skeletons and zombies and focus on the high-value targets: Heroes, Corpse Carts, Wraiths, and monsters. Don't bunch up your infantry too much; Vampire lores of magic are devastating to infantry blobs. Your best strategy is getting a Fire Wizard or 3 on pegasi, as the Vampire Counts have no ranged units.

*'''Wood Elves''': Their archers will outrange your gunpowder units, but they don't have anything that can ''quite'' contest your artillery. Thin their ranks with some Mortars or Helstorm Rocket Batteries and have Shielded Spearmen or Halberdiers screen against their cavalry or larger Forest Spirits. Speaking of which, the Luminarch of Hysh does ''disgusting'' damage to any (Ancient) Treemen stumbling across the battlefield, while a Bright Wizard can make kindling of any Dryads or Tree Kin on the field. Once they get closer, light them up with all manner of firepower. A majority of their roster is unarmored and generally unshielded; they'll take heavy losses. Take a care against their elite infantry; though squishy, they are veritable blenders who will make short work of your soldiers should they make it into melee.

===Domination===

General Tier Rank: '''A'''

As a jack of all trades faction and the way domination works you can reliably 'summon in' answers to whatever your opponent does on the fly. The empires roster is decently mobile and you have lots of options to counter-act your opponents strategy wether it's calling in demigrphys if the lizardman player brings in some dinos or doubling down on artillery you have a great ability to adapt on the fly and win the match

[[Category:Total Warhammer]] {{Total War Warhammer Tactics}}

Total War Warhammer/Tactics/Empire

2023-06-11T21:09:20Z

2A02:1810:4E2C:A900:DC0E:597F:F427:CBEB: /* Multiplayer Strategies */

This is the tactics page for the Total War: Warhammer version of The Empire.

==Why play The Empire?==
*Because who doesn't love the sight of normal, everyday humans beating back the supernatural through sheer force of arms?
*A difficult, but very rewarding playstlye that rewards unit cohesion and combined arms tactics.
*Guns. Lots and lots of guns.
*Because the Karl Franz memes are too god damn good to not play them at least once.
*Humanity, fuck yeah!

===Pros===
*'''Jack of all Trades''': There's not a single department anyone can say you're bad in. The Empire can be played in a variety of different ways that can be viable from gunlines to infantry brawls to skirmish tactics. No plan is off the table for The Empire.
*'''Easy to Learn''': One of the more straightforward armies out there. It doesn't have any rules or units that are too complicated, but their wide roster brings a variety of tools to the table.
*'''[[Gunpowder (Warhammer Fantasy)|Gunpowder]]''': Gunpowder units are powerful in this game and can easily swing a fight in your favor if they are allowed to do their thing. Handgunners and Cannons can make any army regret coming to the field if used well. Their artillery is amazing for its cost and can blast most things into kingdom come.
*'''Flexibility''': As explained before, The Empire can bring a variety of tactics to the table, which can make them hard to predict. They have an answer for just about every race in the game, and while they have some uphill match ups, they can get together a few lists against everyone.
*'''Cavalry''': A very strong Cavalry faction, up there with the best (which kind of detracts form the whole "Jack of all Trades" thing mentioned above) Empire Knights are amazing for their price, and Demigryphs can take on just about any other cav unit one on one and win.
*'''Powerful Legendary Lords''': The Empire has some of the best named characters in the game. Karl Franz and Volkmar can be a massive asset to any battlefield, and Gelt and Wulfhart can be used to amazing effect as well.
*'''Magic''': You have access to every generic lore of magic in the game, including Metal if you pick Gelt as your lord.
*'''Skirmishing''': Don't let all the flashy stuff the Norscans and the Dark Elves wave around fool you: You have some of the best skirmishing units in the game, if not ''the'' best. Both on foot as well as on horseback. Free Company work amazing for their cost and Outriders can be a terrifying mobile gunline when used right.

===Cons===
*'''Master of None''': The main downside of most Jack of all Trades factions. Everyone in the game outclasses you at something. Sure, your State Troops are crushing those Men-at-Arms, but you're cav just got ran over by Grail Knights. Your heavy cav chased of those Wild Riders, but now Waywatchers are putting out more value than your missiles could dream off. Yeah, your gunline and artillery are carving up the Chaos Warriors, but now that they are in melee you can kiss your frontline goodbye. You need to make up for your weaknesses when going up against certain factions.
*''' Mediocre Infantry''': your infantry isn’t bad but unlike most other factions yours isn’t really meant to win the fight, their meant for holding the line, they have average stats across the board but that is their main weakness, they can hold the line but they won’t beat the line, that job is for your artillery and cavalry.
*'''Aerial Inferiority''': Some of your lords and heroes have airborne mounts, but beyond that you got nothing in the sky.
*'''Difficult to Master''': most newer players pick Empire in multiplayer due to their relative ease of campaign in single-player, only to learn they are hard as hell in Multiplayer. The Empire is a faction that requires time and finesses to play perfectly and isn't something you can pick up and play.
*'''DLC Locked Content''': You don't have it as bad as some factions, but you do have some missing stuff you would like on the battlefield. Also, you are the only core race to never get an FLC lord, meaning if you are committed to not buying DLC, you're stuck with Franz and Gelt. (Not that they're bad choices, but more options are always good.)

==The campaign and unique mechanics (The Old World)==
The Empire pretty much fills out the entire northern part of the old world, giving you a very secure starting position with either Franz, Gelt, or Volkmar. The main routes into the Empire, except the infamous Black Fire Pass, are guarded by the Imperial forts from the south and west, and by Kislev from the north.

At the start of the game, The Empire is fractured into many independent provinces, each ruled by an Elector Count. Karl Franz, for example, is the Elector Count of Riekland and you play him as such. Each of the Elector Count factions have Fealty, which shows how loyal the individual Count is to the Empire as a whole. If their fealty reaches zero, they secede from the Empire and start a civil war; if it reaches ten, they will offer you a confederation, causing you to take direct control of their lands and existing armies. If you control the main capital of a province, you can make one of your lords the Elector Count of that province and receive a global bonus of some sort to one or more troop types, a unique passive bonus for the lord in question, and the Runefang of the province, which is an Epic item of some sort with a unique ability that ranges from amazing to useless.

The Elector Counts cannot form military alliances or confederate through normal diplomacy. Instead, the Imperial Authority and Prestige mechanics are used to represent the political power of your faction within the Empire and manage relations with the other Elector Counts. You basically want 1 Imperial Authority and 1000 Prestige at all times, and Elector Count events will give you more at the cost of money, prestige, or diplomatic relations. Prestige increases when you win battles or through events, as well through the number of controlled regions. As with Charles V, the key to ruling the Empire is giving the Elector Counts just enough independence to get themselves into trouble but not enough to cripple the Empire. Do not be in a rush to confederate them through the Imperial Authority mechanic; it builds up slowly and you'll find yourself drawn into frontier wars with powers hostile to the Empire culture instead of leaving it to the Elector Count AI to handle. The exceptions, generally speaking, would be Averland and Stirland, which have a tendency to get deleted by the Vampire Counts and thus inflict Authority losses that can snowball into civil war, the disintegration of the Empire, and mass public unrest in all your provinces. Either confederate those two provinces first, or get involved in the vampire wars and save them from extinction. Any civil war with another Elector Count is a mistake; it will cost you a great deal of Imperial Authority, especially if you actually conquer that Elector's territory and wipe them out yourself.

As is befitting for the most basic faction in the game, the Empire's economy is neither terribly bad, nor exceptionally good. There are few exploits or economic landmarks, aside from some major ports in the hands of neighboring factions, and the economic resources you would usually trade are generally in the hands of other Elector Counts at the start of your campaign, and you will either have to wait for those settlements to be taken by an enemy or fight an unprofitable civil war for them. For most of the early campaign you will be focused on fighting off rogue Greenskin armies and dealing with the Vampire Counts. Expansion opportunities are slim until you can build up some reserves; if you reconquer Marienburg you could expand into Couronne and knock out Louen Louencour early, leaving Bretonnia easy prey for your armies, but you will also be exposed to non-stop Norscan raids. If you try to conquer the Dwarfholds, expect a long, bloody, slog with a faction that should be your trading partner and buffer against the Greenskins, and if you think of heading into the Southern Realms you will find Skaven harassing you everywhere. The overall victory condition for the Empire campaign is uniting all the Elector Count provinces and defeating Archaon.

==Legendary Lords and Subfactions==
*'''[[Karl Franz]]:''' So Franz is your beatstick Legendary Lord and my lord is he good at his job. Thanks to his items he is widely considered one of the best non mage lords in the entire game. First off, Deathclaw is able to give him control of the skies and once you have it it should be what he's on for the entire game, campaign or multiplayer. Ghal Maraz also gives him +16 anti large and armor piercing, making him a damn scary monster killer, and wields the Riekland Runefang, which grants an AOE leadership and attack buff to his troops. Combine that with fear and terror and Franz can be a goddamn nightmare for a lot of factions to deal with. His only real weakness is that if your take him you're pretty much forced to being a Lore of Life mage due to how squishy he is. Aside from that, damn good choice for campaign and multiplayer.
*'''[[Balthasar Gelt]]:''' So Gelt is not only the only lord level mage you have, he's also your only access to the Lore of Metal. The Staff of Volans gives you a crazy amount of magic to play with, meaning you can get quite a few castings of Final Transmutation off in order to delete blobs. Plus, the fact that he can ride a Pegasus means he is decent at keeping himself out of trouble, though if someone gets their hands on him he's probably going to be in trouble. All in all he's a decent pick in multiplayer, especially against heavy armor or factions who love to blob, but there are just better options for you. In the campaign, he can get some crazy buffs to magic, armor, and artillery. Also memes. Lots of memes. Starts in [[Solland]] and not penalize for spreading into the mountains, so lots of non-"allied" factions to expand into.
*'''[[Volkmar the Grim]] (DLC):''' So if you want at least a semi-decent chance at winning the infantry fight, you got to bring Volkmar. On his War Altar of Sigmar, he can be a crazy powerful lord to assist your state troops. While you may see his lack of armor-piercing and wonder how the hell he's going to deal with armored troops, remember that it's his abilities that make him so good. He's got a buffed version of Shield of Faith and Soulfire meaning he can really buff up your infantry troops and deal with blobs fairly well, on half the cooldown normal Priests and Arch-Lectors have too. In the end, though, Jade Griffon is what makes him so amazing, as replenishment makes him ungodly hard to kill. Combine that with the fact that he can cast Banishment twice with no winds of magic use, and you got a buffing, blob destroying beast who can turn your infantry fights from a surefire loss to a possible win. In the campaign he's an alternative to Franz with a focuses on making a single Flagelent death stack possible.
*'''[[Boris Todbringer]] (DLC....Kinda):''' So our boy Toddy has an odd way to unlock him. You'd think he'd be the FLC choice for the Empire but no, CA did something kind of stupid. He could only be unlocked after beating the Eye for an Eye campaign you get when you buy Call of the Beastmen in game 1, and even then only in custom battles and multiplayer. Meaning you have to buy the Beastmen DLC, complete a crappy mini campaign and then you can bring Toddy to multiplayer but not make him playable on campaign. Yeah it's pretty dumb, thankfully you can find mods that only need to be used once to permanently unlock him. At least if you play the second game it's not gonna ask for the mini campaign (But he still remains unavailable as an LL choice on Mortal Empires, why CA, why). Good news is Boris is pretty good in combat. His runefang gives him passive regeneration meaning that while he doesn't do as much damage as Franz, you don't have to babysit him nearly as much. Still has terror and a good leadership and melee capabil bomb ability, so can be very good against low leadership faction.
*'''[[Markus Wulfhart]] (DLC):''' Markus is your choice if you love kite builds but are too manly to be an elf. With vanguard, stalk, nets and TWO different sniping abilities he can take a large target and burn it down pretty darn fast. Armor-piercing anti large means he like fighting factions that rely on big armored monsters, so if you're against someone who loves them, he will do wonders. His biggest problem is his lack of mount options meaning that he is pretty prone to getting gooned out and dying to any decent melee character who realizes he can't get away. He can do some great damage and help out your skirmishers with nets and buffs, but if your opponent wants him dead it's honestly not that hard for them to get him that way. His campaigns place him in [[Lustria]], where he wages a war of "colonization" against the lizardmen. As his underpowered forces escalate the conflict with the dinosaurs with [[lascannon|friken laserbeams]], your backers will ship you reinforcement to further their interests, letting Wulfhart play with late tier units very early in the game. In Vortex he is also gearing up with his fight with [[Nakai the Wanderer|Nakai]], Gathering up and leveling 4 special heroes to tip the scales in the climactic battle between two hunters.

==Units==
===Generic Lords===
*'''[[General of the Empire]]:''' Discount Melee lord. Budget Griffon rider, but most players will make room for a Karl or Boris instead.
*'''[[Arch Lector]] (DLC):''' comparison of discount Volkmar or Priest make lord. Still a good fighter and line supporter with his prayers. He rolled the lord and priest slot together so you can fill the vacant hero slot with a wizard.
*'''[[Huntsman General]] (DLC):''' Discount Wulfhart. Rather than being a powerful sniper, Huntsman is Support Lord for Gunlines. Has fire for days to inflict on Flammable and Regening enemies. Can also shoot exploding fire arrows, give units around him fire attacks and faster shooting, and an Oil attack that makes things weak(er) to fire and slows for more shooting time. Sees less use as most players need a fast-moving melee character to press the enemy and keep monsters off their weak holing lines.

===Legendary Heroes (Huntsmarshal's Expedition only)===
Markus Wulfhart gets four unique heroes to help his quest to conquer Lustria. All four start with Immortality, and three of them are totally unique to the Empire. In the campaign each of the four heroes has a quest chain that allows you to unlock new items and skills for them, much like Legendary Lords. Reaching the end of the quest chains gives each hero a unique effect to aid you in the final battle against [[Nakai the Wanderer]].

*'''Hertwig Van Hal''': An upgraded witch hunter who hates the undead with a passion, giving him bonus damage to all undead but causing diplomatic penalties with Vampire Coast factions. His quest chain gives him one of two abilities; he can either heal allied units, or temporarily make units around him unbreakable. If you plan to keep Markus and the gang together it's best to get the healing ability.
*'''Rodrik L'Anguille''': A Bretonnian paladin and the tank of Wulfharts little RPG team. He's a decent brawler but best used to protect the rest of the group with defensive abilities and high armour. Also, despite being a Bretonnian he [[fail|can't ride a horse]] and has to foot slog into battle, although he can get some speed bonuses with talents. Keep him in the front of the army, ideally with Hertwig or a life wizard nearby to keep him standing. In the campaign, Rodrik can choose between unlocking a unique sword for better offense, or doubling down on his tankieness with even more defensive abilities.
*'''Kalara''': A wood elf Waystalker and your premier assassin. She can venture out on her own with the deadly combination of snipe, stalk, and vanguard deployment; but she also has a few passive buffs to help allied ranged units. Keep her with some huntsmen, or ideally the Deathjacks, for a surgical kill-team that gives enemy lords and heroes nightmares.
*'''Jorek Grimm''': A Dwarf engineer who decided to work with the empire. He can entrench and replenish ammo for your artillary, two things the Empire cannot normally get and desperately needs. Jorek brings a bevy of inventions and items to the campaign, including a [[derp|caster item no-one in the group can use]] and even a freaking [[awesome|gyrocopter]]!, if you play thorek ironbrows quest battle, he is the wazzock you smack around when hunting the big one.

===Heroes===
*'''[[Empire Captain]]:''' Your generic melee hero, and honestly he is probably the worst one in that category. No AP, anti large or infantry, no special support abilities or powers, just a dude with a sword who can't really do anything against most dedicated combat character. His pegasus makes him mobile, letting him kite around the battlefield like a human missile. He's a decent mage hunter, but if you expect him to do anything other than that in multiplayer, prepare to be disappointed. Empire Captains just aren't as strong or resilient as the melee champions of other races. In campaign, a level 40 Empire Captain is a tank and should be used as such. He'll also do a lot better with a Runefang than either a Huntsmen-General or an Arch Lector, so if you appoint either as Elector Counts you should bring a captain to use the sword.
*'''[[Witch Hunter]]:''' Your designated assassin. Has decent melee capabilities, but his main use is his armor piercing pistol which, although short range, packs a hell of a punch. Comes equipped with the Accusation ability, wherein he points at an enemy and yells at it, lowering melee defense, armor, and missile resistance. Works well in conjunction with other ranged units for when you really want one specific unit to get obliterated. His short range and lack of any kind of mount really holds him back, especially against swifter foes.
*'''[[Warrior Priest]]:''' An excellent support hero, his buffs will make every unit around him temporarily win at combat no matter who they're fighting despite the fact your lines were supposed to be one of the weakest infantry in-game. In fact buffing infantry is the most effective use for him since their staying power allows them to make the most of his buffs.
*'''[[Warhammer_Magic#Classic_Lores|Wizards]]:''' One of the strengths of The Empire is that it has a Wizard for every occasion, bar partying with Gelt.
**'''Amber Wizard:''' Unique among Empire wizards, he has access to a griffon mount. Makes your stuff better at fighting and can summon a Feral Manticore for more aerial gooning. Don't rely on him for direct-damage; those spells are unreliable at best and you'll be better off going for a different lore of magic for that.
**'''Amethyst Wizard:''' Specializes for sniping single entities and units with small unit sizes. Aim for high value targets with lots of armor/physical resistance.
**'''Jade Wizard:''' The Hippy is the team medic, Very valuable in any list <s>that has Griffons</s> that has a high value unit or two.
**'''Grey Wizard:''' Specializes in debuffing enemies and occasionally reaping clumps of enemies. The more he casts, the faster your units become.
**'''Bright Wizard:''' A DPS caster that devastates Flammable (almost anything with regen or treekin) units in addition to boosting the damage output of your own.
**'''Celestial Wizard:''' A good, all-around lore. Lots of damage spells with a handful of buff/debuff spells.
**'''Light Wizard:''' Strong lore, letting your units catch a running monster or halt a charge, and can make the difference between your infantry standing and breaking in an important protracted battle.

===Melee Units===
*'''[[Spearmen]]:''' Bare basic troops that have a charge bonus against cavalry. Cheapest of chaff but no shield. You'll see these guys alot in multiplayer, Empire tends to skimp on infantry so they can put more money into missiles/cavalry/artillery.
*'''Spearmen (Shield):''' Spearmen but with better defensive stats and an ability to tank arrows while costing a teeny bit more. Unless a chaos host will be hitting your bare-bones settlement in 2 turns and it's the only thing you can recruit locally, always get Spearmen with Shields.
**'''Eldred's Guard''' (Spearmen)(ECST) In the campaign they are spearmen with expert charge defense and anti-large damage.
*'''[[Swordsmen]]:''' Your very basic melee infantry and the epitome of average. Doesn't do well against all but the weakest of enemy fighters (Think Skavenslaves, Peasants, Zombies) and will get positively obliterated by most of the baseline troops of the WH2 factions. That being said, they work well enough for their cost and have decent morale.
**'''Sigmar's Sons''' (Swordsmen)(ROR): Unbreakable and better defensive states, making them better qualified to hold the line.
**'''Swords of Ulric''' (Swordsmen)(ECST) Swordsmen with frenzy and fear, making them better frontline damage dealers.
*'''[[Greatsword]]s:''' Your melee infantry elite. As usual, nothing all that groundbreaking and a bit frail. They were weak even in the first game and they have only gotten worse as better elite infantry arrived in later games. They have poor stats compared to other elite units and they are overpriced, a trap unit. They don’t kill well, they die easily, and they cost too much.
**'''Carroburg Greatswords''' (Greatswords)(ECST): Unbreakable Greatswords that deal magic damage, as well as an area buff increasing nearby units melee attack. Tend to get focused down a lot by the AI. The aura means bringing one of these to support your frontline is a good investment.
*'''[[Halberdier]]s''': Available fairly early on and a really good option for your frontline. Halberdiers make Bretonnians and Dragon Prince's cry, they are a very cost-effective counter against all matter of heavy cavalry that gets thrown their way. They share the same boons of Greatswords: Armour-Piercing, good model count, decent morale. Granted only 40 armor and no shield means that if the enemy has any kind of missile unit, these guys are going to say hello to Morr very quickly. Your best frontline option if you don’t need shields.
**'''Nordland Mariners''' (Halberdiers)(ECST): The marines negate charge bonus from anything they brace against. They're also aquatic, making them good in fighting in maps with a lot of water like in lustria or on the high sea. They have also have perfect vigor while above 50% health so they can handle long melee grinds better, a straight upgrade to halberders.
*'''[[Flagellant]]s (DLC):''' Your most cost-effective tarpit. While being ''extremely'' fragile, they tie down enemy units, especially those without bonuses against infantry very effectively. Generally speaking, they work better in MP than on the campaign, where Suicide units are not worth it. Combined with an Arch-Lector or Volkmar leading your army (especially the latter, who buffs their Physical Resist up to 33%), they turn into shockingly vicious chaff killers with Bretonnian levels of charge bonus and 50% Missile resist.
**'''The Tattersouls''' (Flagellants)(ROR): Even better at tying down enemy units, having both more health and bigger unit.

===Missile Infantry===
*'''[[Free Company Militia]] (DLC):''' These guys are a very good flanking and dual-purpose unit. They have no AP or much range but they make up for it by being able to fire while moving forward and being somewhat decent in melee for missile standards. This means they can defend themselves against hounds and be able to wrap around the flank, fire into the side or back, and charge if they run out of ammo. All in all a solid unit if used well. In campaigns their versatility makes the auto-resolve AI think they're far more powerful than they actually are.
**'''Stirland's Revenge''' (Free Company Militia)(ROR): come with Stalk and Immune to psychology, along with an ok amount of AP missile damage makes them fill a better ambusher role.
*'''[[Crossbowmen]]:''' your reliable shooting unit, a long-range of 160 and shots will arc over your units. Easy to use and cost-effective if facing enemies with low armor.
**'''Stir River Patrol''' (Crossbowmen)(ECST) Vanguard crossbowmen with fire damage and slowing attacks. Excellent when fighting undead and chaos monsters, dealing big damage while giving dedicated monster slayers an opportunity to catch them.
*'''[[Handgunner]]s:''' There's a reason why the Empire's described as being built on Faith, Steel, and [[Gunpowder (Warhammer Fantasy)|Gunpowder]]. While you do need micro to be effective due to their LOS firing arcs and you usually have to babysit them, Handgunners are a key part of an Empire Army as soon as they're available. These guys are excellent at melting away heavy infantry formations, and there are few things more satisfying than seeing lines of guns mow down a group of chosen. Yeah, selling your soul to the asshole gods was a great choice schmuckos!
**'''The Silver Bullets''' (Handgunners)(ROR): Handgunners with magic guns. Specialize in picking off high-value targets that rely on Physical Resistance for defense.
**'''Gunderson's Surefires''' (Handgunners)(ECST): Essentially free company who traded their pistols for full-sized handguns. They can't fire while moving, but they can vanguard deploy and do well enough in melee.
*'''[[Archer]]s (DLC):''' With a pitiful 120 range and better options on the table, the main advantage these guys have is that they're cheap as dirt and can be recruited at tier 1. Choice #1 if you want to save money and force your opponent to fight in the rain. You will get better results from other options, which have AP or move faster, but quantity has a quality all its own.
**'''Deathjacks''' (Archers)(ROR): What other archers wished they could be. They are set apart by having the powerful combo of Stalk, Snipe, and vanguard deployment, letting them be the ultimate skirmishers, constantly lowering the health of units while the opponent is not looking.
*'''[[Huntsmen]] (DLC):''' Human waywatchers only they swapped out AP for Anti Large. These guys are great at killing low armor monsters and cav and their ability to vanguard and fire while moving makes them ungodly annoying for any army that can't catch them. You're wasting shots if you put them into infantry and don't expect much against super heavily armored monsters, but they can be a pretty useful unit against the right factions.
**'''White Wolves''' (Huntsmen)(ROR): Huntsmen that don't imminently crumble when charged by light skirmishers. Your asking if your going to pay extra so a unit of Huntsmen don't immediately high tale it and probably stop participating in the battle when a unit of hounds bites them.

===Cavalry===
*'''[[Empire Knight]]s:''' Knights were decent when the first game came out, but now they are mediocre at best. Too weak and fragile to standout and outclassed by demigryphs and reiksguard. They are fairly obsolete after the early game and haven’t held up well at all. Maybe you can get some value from the special versions but basic knights aren’t really worth using in campaign.
**'''[[Knights of the Everlasting Light]]'''(Empire Knights)(ECST): Bog-standard Knights with Magic Attacks. Counters Ethereal units and Daemons and provide a melee attack debuff to enemies.
**'''[[Knights of Morr]]'''(Empire Knights)(ECST): Knights that cause Fear and Terror. Will chase way anything that isn't fearless or unbreakable. Crap.
**'''[[Stubborn Bulls]]'''(Empire Knights)(ECST): Empire Questing knights with greatswords instead of lances. High AP cavalry, they are mediocre substitute for Demigryph Knights. The downside is you have to hold the Elector Countship of Ostland, which leaves you exposed to Norscans, Skaven, and Chaos invasions.
*'''[[Reiksguard]]:''' Upgraded Knights, same strengths, same weaknesses. If you're playing MP, take normal Knights, they do the same job for cheaper.
**'''Zintler's Reiksguard'''(Reiksguard) (ROR): Has Vanguard and Immune to Psychology. Gives a little more utility than Reiksguard.
*'''[[Knights of the Blazing Sun]]''' (DLC): Bog-standard Knights with Fire Attacks and Higher DPS values. That's all that is to them. Counters Regenerating units like many undead, tree people, and trolls. Overpriced unless you have their unique building.

===Missile Cavalry===
*'''[[Outrider]]s:''' Outriders rank amongst the best skirmish units in the game, period. Their repeater rifles deliver a tremendous amount of firepower at a decent range and they are very quick on their feet (or rather, hooves). This comes at the relative downsight that, unlike Pistoliers, they cannot fire on the move or in all 360 degrees around them, making good micro a necessity. If you want to have a reference point in how to use them to their best, try playing around with Dragoons in Total War: Empire.
*'''Outriders (Grenade Launcher):''' Screw Elven missile cav, Rotting Promethean Gunners or Norscan Missile cav, ''these'' are the definitive champions of the missile cav game and the best unit across all factions in that category. Grenade Launcher Outriders outright delete high model, low armor infantry and rack up a substantial amount of kills very quickly. Unlike other gunpowder units they can fire over obstacles. Their mobility, firepower, and high price makes them prime targets so keep them safe from missile units and skirmishers like warhounds with enough movement speed to run them down.
**'''The Bordermen''' (Outriders (Grenade Launchers))(ECST): Now with higher ratio of AP damage, letting them deal significantly more damage to high armor enemies.
*'''[[Pistolier]]s:''' If Outriders are your walking gunline, Pistoliers are your dedicated harassers. Fire on the move makes chases go very one-sided, which is their only real boon, apart from being cheap. Their missiles are fairly weak, don't pierce armour and even their ammo count isn't anything that spectacular.
**'''The Noble Sons Abroad''' (Pistoliers)(ECST): Pistoliers with better melee skills and armour. They hit almost as hard as knights on the charge, but without as much AP damage.

===Monster Cavalry===
*'''[[Demigryph Knight|Demigryph Knights]]:''' Versatile monstrous shock cavalry with better survivability than normal cavalry and good armor-piercing damage. However, they are a fairly small and expensive unit that needs to be used carefully when facing factions with AP sniper fire or their own fast, anti-large units. Compares favorably to most heavy cav + monstrous cav with the exceptions of Brettonia's perfect vigor grail knights and the ogres with their even more monstrous mournfang + crusher cavalry.
*'''Demigryph Knights (Halberds):''' Slightly more expensive demigryphs with better anti-large and armor piercing. Better against elite infantry, cavalry, and monsters and generally taken over vanilla demigryphs.
**'''The Royal Altdorf Gryphites (Demigryph Knights)(ROR):''' A step up with better melee defense and terror to rout cavalry that aren't immune to psychology.

===Chariots===
*'''[[War Wagon]] (DLC):''' These things used to be a meme unit, though with the buffs they got I suppose you could make an argument for them. AP shots are nice and the additional tankiness can help them get out of some sticky situations. Plus they can function as chariots even without the AP in melee and the guys on the back can fire while in combat, so that's nice. Outriders will be better in 90% of situations, but honestly, they aren't ''absolutely'' useless.
: They do beat pistoliers and Outriders when it comes to being harassed. High armor and you loss out on potential firepower when all the unused ammunition dies with the models, so War Wagon gives you more shooting for your buck with each wagon taking a lot of punishment before one model is lost compared to how much ammunition is lost when a cavalry unit reaches that same health margin.
*'''War Wagon (Mortar) (DLC):''' Ok, so ''this'' is a meme unit. The extra mobility doesn't make up for the missing ammo and without the guns, to fire they are a hell of a lot worse in melee. Just take normal mortars, they'll do so much better and if you plop a spear unit by them they'll be defended just fine. (still, those Results can be pending) - Changes have been made to the Mortar Wagons, now not suffering from the range, damage, and ammo nerfs this unit previously had. They're still more expensive than regular mortars, so their usefulness is still dubious, although interestingly Mortar Wagons can hide in trees, if you want to conceal your artillery's position up until the last moment.
**'''The Black Lions (War Wagon):''' (ROR) Carries Helblaster Volley Guns and sometimes can shoot over infantry. As with mortar war wagons, it's better to just take the regular artillery. They might be a lot more useful in the campaign due to their instant veterancy. Slightly more useful than the above Wagon's due to it allowing you to get better Helblaster angles.

===Artillery===
*'''[[Mortar]]:''' The first artillery unit you have access to, Mortars are very powerful against blobs of lightly-armored infantry. Their slow and indirect fire means positioning the mortar is less important than ensuring they have as much time as possible to drop explosives on the enemy. While they can be effective against archers, they are very weak to direct attacks and should be kept as far back as possible. They are also fairly inaccurate; don't expect any precision, and keep them from targeting units locked in close combat with yours unless you are targeting the ground or the enemy has blobbed up a lot against a thin line of your own troops. Their best niche is probably in siege battles; lots of enemy units clustered on walls and behind gates are easy kills for them.
**'''Sootson's Guns''' (Mortar)(ECST): Deals magic damage and does not cause friendly fire, making it perfectly safe to shoot at your own units. If you can recruit more of them, and you have not yet unlocked Helstorm Rocket Batteries or want to save money, do so. They are straight-up better than standard mortars.
*'''[[Great Cannon]]:''' Good Ol' Reliable. Will blast holes in most things it hits, thanks to its high AP damage, but it can really only hit things bigger than a house. As is traditional for Total War, you can manually aim and fire the cannon to better aim your shots. Given the nature of its cannonballs, it is surprisingly powerful when fired into the flank of enemy formations, but very inefficient if they're coming straight at the cannon. Surprisingly, they shine best in sieges, able to blast enemy towers, gates, and walls into rubble far faster than mortars. You're not going to get very many of these unless you're planning to do a lot of sieges with that army or planning to fight big, slow monsters like Dread Saurians. Vargheists and Varghulfs, while theoretically good targets, are fast enough to dodge the cannon shots and close in to kill the crew.
**'''Hammer of the Witches''' (Great Cannon)(ROR): Magic cannons that deal 100 more damage per shot. Great when facing elite units with high amounts of physical resistance or ward save.
*'''[[Helblaster Volley Gun]]:''' Fairly good in the hands of a veteran player. These are basically Gatling guns, mowing down infantry and nearly impossible for monsters and cavalry to dodge, unlike cannons. However, good positioning is needed to use them to full effect, and compared to Dwarf [[Organ Gun|Organ Guns]] they have shorter range, lower AP damage, and a slightly lower rate of fire. Get the Black Lions if you can, as their mobility really helps make the best of the Helblaster.
*'''[[Helstorm Rocket Battery]]:''' The cheese stick of the Empire on the campaign map. Given how fragile your melee line is to getting bogged down by at least decent enemy fighters like Night Goblins or Skeleton Warriors, Helstorms are your answer to massive big blobs of chaff. Sporting a ludicrous range combined with nine rockets per salvo ''per piece'' makes them perfect for thinning out hordes of Greenskins, Skaven and Undead. It has got two problems though: Its accuracy is more of a lucky guess at range, where the Helstorm follows the philosophy of "if i throw enough bombs at my enemy, one will hit them", the second and far worse one is that its damage against armoured elite infantry like Chaos Warriors or Swordmasters is subpar at best.
**'''The Sunmaker''' (Helstorm Rocket Battery) (ROR) Trades lower ammunition for significantly more Fire damage. Basically a Cruise Missile that makes Skaven think twice if they should invest in Infantry.
*'''[[Luminark of Hysh]]:''' A Giant's worst nightmare, the Luminark of Hysh deals the most damage of any artillery in Total Warhammer 1. Very accurate, on par with an Amber Spear and with very mild tracking effects, but specialized for targeting single entities. These are great for sniping high-value enemy units, like Lords, Heroes, and Dragons, especially if you can pin them down in some way. The bigger the target, the easier it is to hit with the Luminark. They also have a map-wide debuff that saps their enemy's ability to recharge their Winds of Magic and give your backline an impressive 12% ward save (resistance to physical and magical damage). However, they are near useless in melee, despite being powered by a Light wizard, and cost a lot. Look after them.
**'''Templehof Luminark''' (Luminark of Hysh)(ROR): Can cast Net of Amyntok to stop any unit within range, making it an easy target.
*'''[[Steam Tank]]:''' A heavily-armored, Unbreakable vehicle with a bow-mounted cannon and a turret-mounted steam gun for 360-degree counterattacking capability. As the cannon is mounted in an armored housing, it cannot be angled to target targets below the tank, so make sure that you place the tank on the downhill slope if you put it on high ground. The steam gun itself is fairly weak but has unlimited ammo, making it useful against blobs of low-to-medium tier infantry. The tank also has melee capabilities and a good charge, so it isn't entirely useless even after it runs out of ammunition.
**'''The Emperor's Wrath''' (Steam Tank)(ECST): Has the ability to vent hot steam, preventing enemy units from engaging it for a short time and dealing a decent leadership debuff. It explodes when destroyed, taking out a chunk of whatever was attacking it.

==Tactics==

===Campaign Strategies===
General overall Empire strategy: In Campaign, the crucial thing with the Empire is having the right army composition. Usually, you gotta have the lord and 1-3 heroes, 2-4 cavalry/chariot units, 2-4 artillery units, no more than 4-6 missile infantry units, and the rest (around a third of your army) MUST be hand-to-hand infantry units. Do NOT go overboard with artillery and missile units, always have, at the very least, 6-8 melee infantry units, and use your general and melee heroes to hold back the enemy. Get this into your head: your melee infantry is your worst weakness, but it's also your backbone. Without them, all your shiny and deathly artillery will fail miserably. Your infantry is mediocre at best: low armor and hp make them die to a breeze, with bad strength they don't kill shit, and most of all, their low morale will make them run pretty soon. The combination of all these factors makes them very unreliable. More, more unreliable than you think when you begin the battle.

First of all, you need numbers: without that, you'll lose, 100% guaranteed. Even if you win a battle with only five swordsmen units and get cocky, in the next battle you'll find they're only at half strength (Empire infantry gets decimated in each battle, even victorious ones) and you'll get your ass handed to yourself. Get Halberdiers asap, their defensive nature makes them perfect for an Empire gunline (which most of the time your army will be). You also need to place them right (spears/halberdiers in the flanks to protect against cavalry, no weak points in the battle line, no exposed flanks), and you need to support the right heroes with "Hold the line" and priests with battle prayers evenly distributed in the line, cavalry in the flanks prepared to intervene when necessary, mages to buff the line/debuff the enemy. Without a reliable wall of steel in front of them, your missiles and artillery won't have enough time to do their thing, and if the enemy gets to them, not only will they stop firing, they will suffer great (perhaps irreparable) casualties, the nearby units will get demoralized, and you'll have to dedicate a lot of resources to contain the breach, weakening the rest of your line. Do NOT let your battle line get breached!

When you progress in the game, you won't have to rely so much on the h2h infantry battle line. Your griffon/horsey general/captain/priest, with all their buffs, can contain whole units by themselves, your mages can use their flying mounts to position their spells where they are truly devastating, your high-end artillery can work miracles, and demi-gryph knights can operate independently. And yet, do not delude yourself: without a good battle line, all will be for naught. Greatswords are good but not truly great (heh), do not think they are Ironbreakers or you'll pay for it. As always, even if I repeat myself, never leave home without around a third of your army being melee infantry!

About mages, remember, with Empire the name of the game is buff/debuffs. Your little guys truly need them, do not use missile and offensive magic unless you have a lot of magic reserves and will get a lot of advantage when doing it. Later in the game, when you have a good mage with lots of magic reserves, some vortexes, either moving or immobile, and things like Comet of Cassandora can be outright devastating when the massed enemy is being contained by your battle line and you cast them right in the middle of them. But even then, only do it AFTER you have buffed/debuffed the right units and have the battle more or less under control.

About pistoliers/outriders, they only shine when you have many of them, and can shoot a unit while it's occupated pursuing your other units. This is especially true with outriders, who can't move and shoot. Lonely units won't do much, but having said that, even if they only manage to get one enemy infantry unit away from the main battle when the action takes place, they have justified their cost.

About empire knights and all their variants, remember that even with all their armor they die fast in prolonged combat, or get whittled down by the enemy fire. Never let them get too far from your battle line, where their slowness (for cavalry) can make them get surrounded and destroyed by the enemy. Their primary use is to support your infantry, not to chase enemy missiles away (although they can and should do that sometimes, of course).

To sum it all up, never forget that, in this game, Empire is the closest thing to managing a real-life army: one moment of overconfidence and many lives will be lost!

===legendary lord, Immortal Empires guide===
'''Karl Franz:''' in Immortal Empires, his starting position got a hell of a lot harder, surrounded by enemies on all sides, elector counts with a death wish, and did I mention enemies on all sides?

your first goal as always is to wipe out the rebels, take Helmgart, and start building for when Grom or tree-Hitler come knocking, the next order of business, is to rescue Middenland or Stirland, Middenland tends to die first in most cases due to Festus and Khazrak, Festus in particular must die, as he often kills Hochland and the penalty's when in negative authority are HUGE, so rush up north and kill him fast, getting an arch-lector with points in untainted can be helpful with removing the large amounts of chaos corruption there will inevitably be due to those bastards, the next step is to kill the vampires, and if luck is on your side, Stirland will have at least one settlement left or gelt is helping to hold the line, buts it's still not easy, if you're really unlucky in reaching Festus and/or Khazrak, they can leave vast portions of the Empire as ruins and you'll have to put up with Kislev and others trying to settle said ruins, and good luck getting them back, as the AI is a bitch about trading settlements, you can offer them 50k gold but there's a high chance it will fail regardless, forcing you to wage war on what should be an economic ally/meatshield for all the daemons up north.

to wrap up, Karl is surrounded by enemies on all sides, the Ai is annoying as ever, counts are suicidal and the imperial authority is what ends your campaign, as the counts die left, right, and center.

well, my good man, you have your work cut out for you, may the odds be in your favor! FOR SIGMAR!

'''Balthazar gelt:'''

'''Volkmar the grim:'''

'''Markus wulfheart:'''

===Multiplayer Strategies===
The Empire is supposed to be the quintessential Jack of all Trades faction. You are good at a multitude of strategies, but you also don't overtly specialize in anything. This flexibility allows you to be one of the more unpredictable and versatile factions in the trilogy, allowing you to use all kinds of tactics from skirmishing to gun lines to infantry rushes and heavy cav builds. Sadly, while you are good at using these multitude of tactics, every faction in the game will out match you in something. Sure, you have the tools to exploit the weaknesses of others, but if you try to out skirmish the Wood Elves or out melee Chaos you shouldn't be surprised when it goes tits up for you. Contrary to what you may believe as the main human faction, this is not a beginner friendly army and needs experience and good micro to use well. Still, you have plenty of ways to take the field and destroy your enemies. FOR SIGMAR!

*'''Beastmen''': The Beastmen are going to get into melee whether you like it or not, but you can soften them up before they get there. Bring Crossbowmen and Handgunners to soften the enemy up, and some Spearmen and Halberdiers to absorb the enemies charge. If your micro game is strong you can do some good damage with Pistoliers; but Free Company Militia are to slow to keep away from the Beastmen. Bringing Toddy isn't just fluffy, he's pretty great against low leadership enemies like the Beastmen. Don't bring normal artillery unless you can keep it totally bubble-wrapped with infantry; a Steam Tank will usually work better than a couple of cannons. You should bring at least one Luminark to deal with enemy monsters, just keep it safe from flanking attacks.

*'''Bretonnia''': Your cavalry is good, but the Bretonnians will win in the cycle-charge game. Halberdiers are your best friends here; they can split knights apart with their high AP and anti-large damage. Keep some handguns and hellblasters to shoot the knights down when they break away from melee, and bring some outriders to delete the enemy elite.

*'''Daemons of Chaos''':

*'''Chaos Dwarfs''': Your best bet is to go very wide, with a lot of cheap spearmen for your frontline. Chaos Dwarf elite infantry is very expensive and they'll usually rely on a lot of "Labourer" chaff units to cover the field. Your spears will hold fine against them. You probably want to bring at least one Great Cannon or other artillery unit to keep the Dawi-Zharr. Magma Cannons are good at burning down artillery crews but your cannons get four shots to their one. For real killing power though you want to exploit your superior mobility. Bring Outriders, Knights, Demigryphs, and War Wagons. Almost all of them will do fine in melee against Wolf Raiders and can quickly reposition to try and avoid Chaos Dwarf gunlines. The best counter against you in this case is Bull centaurs but Bull Centaurs are slow for monstrous cavalry and can be easily kited by War Wagons. Leave your Handgunners at home; they're too stationary and will get blasted to pieces by the many horrifying artillery pieces the Chaos Dwarfs can roll out.

*'''Chaos Warriors''': Chaos generally don't bring their elite infantry options here as they're very vulnerable to missiles and most state troops are unarmored to start with. As such, Greatswords can be a great support tool for your frontline. Two of them can help take out most Chaos infantry aside from Chosen with support from spears. Aside from that, your options generally revolve around whether you want to pick Franz or Volkmar. If you pick Franz to deal with monsters, go for mobility. Two outriders can tear most of the Chaos army apart and you can use Empire knights to protect them from lighter maurader and hound units. Be sure to bring a life wizard to keep Franz alive. If you want Volkmar to guarantee an infantry win, a few handgunners can be brought to pick apart Shaggoths and a couple cav units and a light wizard with nets can be used to support them.

*'''Dark Elves''': This is one of the few match ups were Lance Demigryphs are better than the Halberd version. Due to the amount of range AP the Dark Elves bring the shield is super important to help keep them alive, and since Dark Elves don't rely much on heavy cav these guys are better for cycle charging infantry. Aside from that, your main issue is going to be dealing with all the mobile range. Pistolers trade very cost effectively against Dark Elf ranged cav and Markus can help make sure they stay in place with his nets. Handgunners are also good to get rid of their scarier units like Morathi and Malekith. If you want a lord that can actually fight if needed, Volkmar is great with some heavy cav as long as you can protect your ranged pieces. Generally Dark Elves like to go on the offensive, so you're the one who will have to turtle up with an unbreakable frontline and try to pick off all of the good targets that you can.

*'''Dwarfs''': Dwarves are the Empire turned up to eleven, which makes sense considering how much the Empire learned from the dwarves. Their artillery is better than yours, their infantry are stronger, and their lack of magic is made up for with their innate magic resistance. The Empire is faster, which can help, but high Dwarf leadership and melee defense means cycle-charging isn't a surefire strategy. Generally, you'll want to separate dwarf units, especially their ranged units from their melee units, and flank the former while occupying the latter's attention with a line of disposable Greatswords and the like. Huntsmen outrange dwarf ranged units, and can be used to good effect when skirmishing, while Outriders' high AP and speed make them very effective on larger maps. Forget Pistoliers, Archers, Swordsmen, and Spearmen; their low AP makes them useless against everything except Slayers.

*'''Empire''': As above, separate front- and backline units and take out the artillery. The Empire's variety of wizards presents a moderate challenge, requiring you to pay much more attention to positioning and movement of your ranged units if you want to get rid of them without excessive losses.

*'''Grand Cathay''':

*'''Greenskins''': Are you into kiting? If not, tough luck. Orcs just straight up walk all over your melee troops and Black Orcs and Trolls bring enough AP damage on their own to give your elite infantry a very hard time. You'll need to tarpit their slow, lubering advance long enough for your missle troops and artillery to shoot them to pieces. Helblasters and Hellstorm Rocket Batteries work wonders to thin out the green tide and Outriders can be a pain in the Greenskins arse to deal with since nothing they have is fast enough to catch them... until their ammo runs out, that is. You can also get good mileage out of Demigryphs, greenskins don't have anti-charge units and their cavalry will lose to yours.

*'''High Elves''': THe only other roster to be as generalistic as yours, and believe it or not, you actually have a sizeable advantage. For one, none of your otherwise flimsy infantry is actually that bad against HE baseline options like Rangers or Spearmen due to bigger units and higher HP. Second, your artillery can seriously ruin the day of any units the High Elves can bring. And finally, any of your options is much more cost-effective in comparison; you can bring two units of Swordsmen for the price of one unit of HE Spearmen, and even one unit of Swordsmen can handily win against them. Their elite units have "shoot me" written all over them for your artillery and missile units, a request you should oblige.

*'''Khorne''':

*'''Kislev''':

*'''Lizardmen''': Use your artillery to devastate their infantry, use your gunners to hunt down their monsters, use your infantry only as a last resort if the Lizardmen close the distance. If they have Terradons, prioritize accordingly; Riders can be ignored, FireLeech Bolas can't. If you can shut down their speedier units (like Cold One Riders, Carnosaurs or Horned Ones), your cavalry can get some solid work done through some well placed cycle charges while keeping two steps ahead of the plodding lizards. In general, you'll want to have your forces in a relatively lose formation; between the Slann, Skink Priests and various AoE abilities at their beck and call, you don't want to lose half of your frontline to a Banishment or Chain Lightning cast, something they'll be able to toss about relatively frequently.

*'''Norsca''': The traditional foe of the Empire is vulnerable to being flanked, their access to Hounds not withstanding. Cavalry can be put to good use against Norscans as they close in on your forces, though the many units equipped with big shields in their army mean you'll have to micromanage your archers and gunners in battle. Your biggest challenge will be dealing with and clearing out the Norscan's faster units before their slower infantry and monsters crash against your lines, as many of their faster units are going to be very good at dodging artillery fire, and indeed at closing on your artillery crews.

*'''Nurgle''':

*'''Ogre Kingdoms''': This should be an easy matchup if you play it right. With Huntsmen, Markus Wulfheart, Great cannons, and Luminarks combined with the Ogres' relative lack of armor and shields, they will quickly be reduced to big, chunky corpses. As long as you watch out for Gnoblar Trappers, your missile cavalry will have a field day gunning down Ogres. Consider targeting Ogre artillery with yours due to the amount of damage they can do from afar and up close. Bring an anti-large frontline, but support it when melee is joined to make winning the close fight possible.

*'''Skaven''': Weapons Teams will slaughter your infantry if you let them. Use your artillery to outrange them, and use your heroes to clear out mobs of Stormvermin and Bombardiers. Empire infantry, ranged and melee, are much better than theirs, but beware their summoning abilities lest they destroy your firing line. Empire cavalry, particularly Pistoliers, can be useful if you don't have many heroes, but large Skaven units can bog them down easily after the latest cavalry/mass changes.

*'''Slaanesh''':

*'''Tomb Kings''': Target the Tomb Kings. Everything else, bar the Sphinxes and Scorpions, are a distraction and waste of ammunition. Use your infantry to bog them down and keep firing.

*'''Vampire Coast''': As with all undead factions, you should try to take down their leader as soon as you can. Leave your unarmored footmen at home; anyone without a shield will be shot to death in short order. Bring plenty of long range firepower and at least one or two Luminarks to take down the enemy monsters (prioritize Necrofex Colossi first, then Leviathans, then everything else). Pistoliers are a good choice for this army; most of the enemy infantry units have no armour to speak of. When picking magic support there really isn't a wrong answer for this matchup, but anything with a vortex will do great against large hordes of slow-moving enemies.

*'''Tzeentch''':

*'''Vampire Counts''': Target the Vampire Lords. If you can't, avoid wasting your precious ranged units' ammunition on chaff like skeletons and zombies and focus on the high-value targets: Heroes, Corpse Carts, Wraiths, and monsters. Don't bunch up your infantry too much; Vampire lores of magic are devastating to infantry blobs. Your best strategy is getting a Fire Wizard or 3 on pegasi, as the Vampire Counts have no ranged units.

*'''Wood Elves''': Their archers will outrange your gunpowder units, but they don't have anything that can ''quite'' contest your artillery. Thin their ranks with some Mortars or Helstorm Rocket Batteries and have Shielded Spearmen or Halberdiers screen against their cavalry or larger Forest Spirits. Speaking of which, the Luminarch of Hysh does ''disgusting'' damage to any (Ancient) Treemen stumbling across the battlefield, while a Bright Wizard can make kindling of any Dryads or Tree Kin on the field. Once they get closer, light them up with all manner of firepower. A majority of their roster is unarmored and generally unshielded; they'll take heavy losses. Take a care against their elite infantry; though squishy, they are veritable blenders who will make short work of your soldiers should they make it into melee.

===Domination===

General Tier Rank: '''A'''

As a jack of all trades faction and the way domination works you can reliably 'summon in' answers to whatever your opponent does on the fly. The empires roster is decently mobile and you have lots of options to counter-act your opponents strategy wether it's calling in demigrphys if the lizardman player brings in some dinos or doubling down on artillery you have a great ability to adapt on the fly and win the match

[[Category:Total Warhammer]] {{Total War Warhammer Tactics}}

Total War Warhammer/Tactics/Empire

2023-06-11T20:39:19Z

2A02:1810:4E2C:A900:DC0E:597F:F427:CBEB:

This is the tactics page for the Total War: Warhammer version of The Empire.

==Why play The Empire?==
*Because who doesn't love the sight of normal, everyday humans beating back the supernatural through sheer force of arms?
*A difficult, but very rewarding playstlye that rewards unit cohesion and combined arms tactics.
*Guns. Lots and lots of guns.
*Because the Karl Franz memes are too god damn good to not play them at least once.
*Humanity, fuck yeah!

===Pros===
*'''Jack of all Trades''': There's not a single department anyone can say you're bad in. The Empire can be played in a variety of different ways that can be viable from gunlines to infantry brawls to skirmish tactics. No plan is off the table for The Empire.
*'''Easy to Learn''': One of the more straightforward armies out there. It doesn't have any rules or units that are too complicated, but their wide roster brings a variety of tools to the table.
*'''[[Gunpowder (Warhammer Fantasy)|Gunpowder]]''': Gunpowder units are powerful in this game and can easily swing a fight in your favor if they are allowed to do their thing. Handgunners and Cannons can make any army regret coming to the field if used well. Their artillery is amazing for its cost and can blast most things into kingdom come.
*'''Flexibility''': As explained before, The Empire can bring a variety of tactics to the table, which can make them hard to predict. They have an answer for just about every race in the game, and while they have some uphill match ups, they can get together a few lists against everyone.
*'''Cavalry''': A very strong Cavalry faction, up there with the best (which kind of detracts form the whole "Jack of all Trades" thing mentioned above) Empire Knights are amazing for their price, and Demigryphs can take on just about any other cav unit one on one and win.
*'''Powerful Legendary Lords''': The Empire has some of the best named characters in the game. Karl Franz and Volkmar can be a massive asset to any battlefield, and Gelt and Wulfhart can be used to amazing effect as well.
*'''Magic''': You have access to every generic lore of magic in the game, including Metal if you pick Gelt as your lord.
*'''Skirmishing''': Don't let all the flashy stuff the Norscans and the Dark Elves wave around fool you: You have some of the best skirmishing units in the game, if not ''the'' best. Both on foot as well as on horseback. Free Company work amazing for their cost and Outriders can be a terrifying mobile gunline when used right.

===Cons===
*'''Master of None''': The main downside of most Jack of all Trades factions. Everyone in the game outclasses you at something. Sure, your State Troops are crushing those Men-at-Arms, but you're cav just got ran over by Grail Knights. Your heavy cav chased of those Wild Riders, but now Waywatchers are putting out more value than your missiles could dream off. Yeah, your gunline and artillery are carving up the Chaos Warriors, but now that they are in melee you can kiss your frontline goodbye. You need to make up for your weaknesses when going up against certain factions.
*''' Mediocre Infantry''': your infantry isn’t bad but unlike most other factions yours isn’t really meant to win the fight, their meant for holding the line, they have average stats across the board but that is their main weakness, they can hold the line but they won’t beat the line, that job is for your artillery and cavalry.
*'''Aerial Inferiority''': Some of your lords and heroes have airborne mounts, but beyond that you got nothing in the sky.
*'''Difficult to Master''': most newer players pick Empire in multiplayer due to their relative ease of campaign in single-player, only to learn they are hard as hell in Multiplayer. The Empire is a faction that requires time and finesses to play perfectly and isn't something you can pick up and play.
*'''DLC Locked Content''': You don't have it as bad as some factions, but you do have some missing stuff you would like on the battlefield. Also, you are the only core race to never get an FLC lord, meaning if you are committed to not buying DLC, you're stuck with Franz and Gelt. (Not that they're bad choices, but more options are always good.)

==The campaign and unique mechanics (The Old World)==
The Empire pretty much fills out the entire northern part of the old world, giving you a very secure starting position with either Franz, Gelt, or Volkmar. The main routes into the Empire, except the infamous Black Fire Pass, are guarded by the Imperial forts from the south and west, and by Kislev from the north.

At the start of the game, The Empire is fractured into many independent provinces, each ruled by an Elector Count. Karl Franz, for example, is the Elector Count of Riekland and you play him as such. Each of the Elector Count factions have Fealty, which shows how loyal the individual Count is to the Empire as a whole. If their fealty reaches zero, they secede from the Empire and start a civil war; if it reaches ten, they will offer you a confederation, causing you to take direct control of their lands and existing armies. If you control the main capital of a province, you can make one of your lords the Elector Count of that province and receive a global bonus of some sort to one or more troop types, a unique passive bonus for the lord in question, and the Runefang of the province, which is an Epic item of some sort with a unique ability that ranges from amazing to useless.

The Elector Counts cannot form military alliances or confederate through normal diplomacy. Instead, the Imperial Authority and Prestige mechanics are used to represent the political power of your faction within the Empire and manage relations with the other Elector Counts. You basically want 1 Imperial Authority and 1000 Prestige at all times, and Elector Count events will give you more at the cost of money, prestige, or diplomatic relations. Prestige increases when you win battles or through events, as well through the number of controlled regions. As with Charles V, the key to ruling the Empire is giving the Elector Counts just enough independence to get themselves into trouble but not enough to cripple the Empire. Do not be in a rush to confederate them through the Imperial Authority mechanic; it builds up slowly and you'll find yourself drawn into frontier wars with powers hostile to the Empire culture instead of leaving it to the Elector Count AI to handle. The exceptions, generally speaking, would be Averland and Stirland, which have a tendency to get deleted by the Vampire Counts and thus inflict Authority losses that can snowball into civil war, the disintegration of the Empire, and mass public unrest in all your provinces. Either confederate those two provinces first, or get involved in the vampire wars and save them from extinction. Any civil war with another Elector Count is a mistake; it will cost you a great deal of Imperial Authority, especially if you actually conquer that Elector's territory and wipe them out yourself.

As is befitting for the most basic faction in the game, the Empire's economy is neither terribly bad, nor exceptionally good. There are few exploits or economic landmarks, aside from some major ports in the hands of neighboring factions, and the economic resources you would usually trade are generally in the hands of other Elector Counts at the start of your campaign, and you will either have to wait for those settlements to be taken by an enemy or fight an unprofitable civil war for them. For most of the early campaign you will be focused on fighting off rogue Greenskin armies and dealing with the Vampire Counts. Expansion opportunities are slim until you can build up some reserves; if you reconquer Marienburg you could expand into Couronne and knock out Louen Louencour early, leaving Bretonnia easy prey for your armies, but you will also be exposed to non-stop Norscan raids. If you try to conquer the Dwarfholds, expect a long, bloody, slog with a faction that should be your trading partner and buffer against the Greenskins, and if you think of heading into the Southern Realms you will find Skaven harassing you everywhere. The overall victory condition for the Empire campaign is uniting all the Elector Count provinces and defeating Archaon.

==Legendary Lords and Subfactions==
*'''[[Karl Franz]]:''' So Franz is your beatstick Legendary Lord and my lord is he good at his job. Thanks to his items he is widely considered one of the best non mage lords in the entire game. First off, Deathclaw is able to give him control of the skies and once you have it it should be what he's on for the entire game, campaign or multiplayer. Ghal Maraz also gives him +16 anti large and armor piercing, making him a damn scary monster killer, and wields the Riekland Runefang, which grants an AOE leadership and attack buff to his troops. Combine that with fear and terror and Franz can be a goddamn nightmare for a lot of factions to deal with. His only real weakness is that if your take him you're pretty much forced to being a Lore of Life mage due to how squishy he is. Aside from that, damn good choice for campaign and multiplayer.
*'''[[Balthasar Gelt]]:''' So Gelt is not only the only lord level mage you have, he's also your only access to the Lore of Metal. The Staff of Volans gives you a crazy amount of magic to play with, meaning you can get quite a few castings of Final Transmutation off in order to delete blobs. Plus, the fact that he can ride a Pegasus means he is decent at keeping himself out of trouble, though if someone gets their hands on him he's probably going to be in trouble. All in all he's a decent pick in multiplayer, especially against heavy armor or factions who love to blob, but there are just better options for you. In the campaign, he can get some crazy buffs to magic, armor, and artillery. Also memes. Lots of memes. Starts in [[Solland]] and not penalize for spreading into the mountains, so lots of non-"allied" factions to expand into.
*'''[[Volkmar the Grim]] (DLC):''' So if you want at least a semi-decent chance at winning the infantry fight, you got to bring Volkmar. On his War Altar of Sigmar, he can be a crazy powerful lord to assist your state troops. While you may see his lack of armor-piercing and wonder how the hell he's going to deal with armored troops, remember that it's his abilities that make him so good. He's got a buffed version of Shield of Faith and Soulfire meaning he can really buff up your infantry troops and deal with blobs fairly well, on half the cooldown normal Priests and Arch-Lectors have too. In the end, though, Jade Griffon is what makes him so amazing, as replenishment makes him ungodly hard to kill. Combine that with the fact that he can cast Banishment twice with no winds of magic use, and you got a buffing, blob destroying beast who can turn your infantry fights from a surefire loss to a possible win. In the campaign he's an alternative to Franz with a focuses on making a single Flagelent death stack possible.
*'''[[Boris Todbringer]] (DLC....Kinda):''' So our boy Toddy has an odd way to unlock him. You'd think he'd be the FLC choice for the Empire but no, CA did something kind of stupid. He could only be unlocked after beating the Eye for an Eye campaign you get when you buy Call of the Beastmen in game 1, and even then only in custom battles and multiplayer. Meaning you have to buy the Beastmen DLC, complete a crappy mini campaign and then you can bring Toddy to multiplayer but not make him playable on campaign. Yeah it's pretty dumb, thankfully you can find mods that only need to be used once to permanently unlock him. At least if you play the second game it's not gonna ask for the mini campaign (But he still remains unavailable as an LL choice on Mortal Empires, why CA, why). Good news is Boris is pretty good in combat. His runefang gives him passive regeneration meaning that while he doesn't do as much damage as Franz, you don't have to babysit him nearly as much. Still has terror and a good leadership and melee capabil bomb ability, so can be very good against low leadership faction.
*'''[[Markus Wulfhart]] (DLC):''' Markus is your choice if you love kite builds but are too manly to be an elf. With vanguard, stalk, nets and TWO different sniping abilities he can take a large target and burn it down pretty darn fast. Armor-piercing anti large means he like fighting factions that rely on big armored monsters, so if you're against someone who loves them, he will do wonders. His biggest problem is his lack of mount options meaning that he is pretty prone to getting gooned out and dying to any decent melee character who realizes he can't get away. He can do some great damage and help out your skirmishers with nets and buffs, but if your opponent wants him dead it's honestly not that hard for them to get him that way. His campaigns place him in [[Lustria]], where he wages a war of "colonization" against the lizardmen. As his underpowered forces escalate the conflict with the dinosaurs with [[lascannon|friken laserbeams]], your backers will ship you reinforcement to further their interests, letting Wulfhart play with late tier units very early in the game. In Vortex he is also gearing up with his fight with [[Nakai the Wanderer|Nakai]], Gathering up and leveling 4 special heroes to tip the scales in the climactic battle between two hunters.

==Units==
===Generic Lords===
*'''[[General of the Empire]]:''' Discount Melee lord. Budget Griffon rider, but most players will make room for a Karl or Boris instead.
*'''[[Arch Lector]] (DLC):''' comparison of discount Volkmar or Priest make lord. Still a good fighter and line supporter with his prayers. He rolled the lord and priest slot together so you can fill the vacant hero slot with a wizard.
*'''[[Huntsman General]] (DLC):''' Discount Wulfhart. Rather than being a powerful sniper, Huntsman is Support Lord for Gunlines. Has fire for days to inflict on Flammable and Regening enemies. Can also shoot exploding fire arrows, give units around him fire attacks and faster shooting, and an Oil attack that makes things weak(er) to fire and slows for more shooting time. Sees less use as most players need a fast-moving melee character to press the enemy and keep monsters off their weak holing lines.

===Legendary Heroes (Huntsmarshal's Expedition only)===
Markus Wulfhart gets four unique heroes to help his quest to conquer Lustria. All four start with Immortality, and three of them are totally unique to the Empire. In the campaign each of the four heroes has a quest chain that allows you to unlock new items and skills for them, much like Legendary Lords. Reaching the end of the quest chains gives each hero a unique effect to aid you in the final battle against [[Nakai the Wanderer]].

*'''Hertwig Van Hal''': An upgraded witch hunter who hates the undead with a passion, giving him bonus damage to all undead but causing diplomatic penalties with Vampire Coast factions. His quest chain gives him one of two abilities; he can either heal allied units, or temporarily make units around him unbreakable. If you plan to keep Markus and the gang together it's best to get the healing ability.
*'''Rodrik L'Anguille''': A Bretonnian paladin and the tank of Wulfharts little RPG team. He's a decent brawler but best used to protect the rest of the group with defensive abilities and high armour. Also, despite being a Bretonnian he [[fail|can't ride a horse]] and has to foot slog into battle, although he can get some speed bonuses with talents. Keep him in the front of the army, ideally with Hertwig or a life wizard nearby to keep him standing. In the campaign, Rodrik can choose between unlocking a unique sword for better offense, or doubling down on his tankieness with even more defensive abilities.
*'''Kalara''': A wood elf Waystalker and your premier assassin. She can venture out on her own with the deadly combination of snipe, stalk, and vanguard deployment; but she also has a few passive buffs to help allied ranged units. Keep her with some huntsmen, or ideally the Deathjacks, for a surgical kill-team that gives enemy lords and heroes nightmares.
*'''Jorek Grimm''': A Dwarf engineer who decided to work with the empire. He can entrench and replenish ammo for your artillary, two things the Empire cannot normally get and desperately needs. Jorek brings a bevy of inventions and items to the campaign, including a [[derp|caster item no-one in the group can use]] and even a freaking [[awesome|gyrocopter]]!, if you play thorek ironbrows quest battle, he is the wazzock you smack around when hunting the big one.

===Heroes===
*'''[[Empire Captain]]:''' Your generic melee hero, and honestly he is probably the worst one in that category. No AP, anti large or infantry, no special support abilities or powers, just a dude with a sword who can't really do anything against most dedicated combat character. His pegasus makes him mobile, letting him kite around the battlefield like a human missile. He's a decent mage hunter, but if you expect him to do anything other than that in multiplayer, prepare to be disappointed. Empire Captains just aren't as strong or resilient as the melee champions of other races. In campaign, a level 40 Empire Captain is a tank and should be used as such. He'll also do a lot better with a Runefang than either a Huntsmen-General or an Arch Lector, so if you appoint either as Elector Counts you should bring a captain to use the sword.
*'''[[Witch Hunter]]:''' Your designated assassin. Has decent melee capabilities, but his main use is his armor piercing pistol which, although short range, packs a hell of a punch. Comes equipped with the Accusation ability, wherein he points at an enemy and yells at it, lowering melee defense, armor, and missile resistance. Works well in conjunction with other ranged units for when you really want one specific unit to get obliterated. His short range and lack of any kind of mount really holds him back, especially against swifter foes.
*'''[[Warrior Priest]]:''' An excellent support hero, his buffs will make every unit around him temporarily win at combat no matter who they're fighting despite the fact your lines were supposed to be one of the weakest infantry in-game. In fact buffing infantry is the most effective use for him since their staying power allows them to make the most of his buffs.
*'''[[Warhammer_Magic#Classic_Lores|Wizards]]:''' One of the strengths of The Empire is that it has a Wizard for every occasion, bar partying with Gelt.
**'''Amber Wizard:''' Unique among Empire wizards, he has access to a griffon mount. Makes your stuff better at fighting and can summon a Feral Manticore for more aerial gooning. Don't rely on him for direct-damage; those spells are unreliable at best and you'll be better off going for a different lore of magic for that.
**'''Amethyst Wizard:''' Specializes for sniping single entities and units with small unit sizes. Aim for high value targets with lots of armor/physical resistance.
**'''Jade Wizard:''' The Hippy is the team medic, Very valuable in any list <s>that has Griffons</s> that has a high value unit or two.
**'''Grey Wizard:''' Specializes in debuffing enemies and occasionally reaping clumps of enemies. The more he casts, the faster your units become.
**'''Bright Wizard:''' A DPS caster that devastates Flammable (almost anything with regen or treekin) units in addition to boosting the damage output of your own.
**'''Celestial Wizard:''' A good, all-around lore. Lots of damage spells with a handful of buff/debuff spells.
**'''Light Wizard:''' Strong lore, letting your units catch a running monster or halt a charge, and can make the difference between your infantry standing and breaking in an important protracted battle.

===Melee Units===
*'''[[Spearmen]]:''' Bare basic troops that have a charge bonus against cavalry. Cheapest of chaff but no shield. You'll see these guys alot in multiplayer, Empire tends to skimp on infantry so they can put more money into missiles/cavalry/artillery.
*'''Spearmen (Shield):''' Spearmen but with better defensive stats and an ability to tank arrows while costing a teeny bit more. Unless a chaos host will be hitting your bare-bones settlement in 2 turns and it's the only thing you can recruit locally, always get Spearmen with Shields.
**'''Eldred's Guard''' (Spearmen)(ECST) In the campaign they are spearmen with expert charge defense and anti-large damage.
*'''[[Swordsmen]]:''' Your very basic melee infantry and the epitome of average. Doesn't do well against all but the weakest of enemy fighters (Think Skavenslaves, Peasants, Zombies) and will get positively obliterated by most of the baseline troops of the WH2 factions. That being said, they work well enough for their cost and have decent morale.
**'''Sigmar's Sons''' (Swordsmen)(ROR): Unbreakable and better defensive states, making them better qualified to hold the line.
**'''Swords of Ulric''' (Swordsmen)(ECST) Swordsmen with frenzy and fear, making them better frontline damage dealers.
*'''[[Greatsword]]s:''' Your melee infantry elite. As usual, nothing all that groundbreaking and a bit frail. They were weak even in the first game and they have only gotten worse as better elite infantry arrived in later games. They have poor stats compared to other elite units and they are overpriced, a trap unit. They don’t kill well, they die easily, and they cost too much.
**'''Carroburg Greatswords''' (Greatswords)(ECST): Unbreakable Greatswords that deal magic damage, as well as an area buff increasing nearby units melee attack. Tend to get focused down a lot by the AI. The aura means bringing one of these to support your frontline is a good investment.
*'''[[Halberdier]]s''': Available fairly early on and a really good option for your frontline. Halberdiers make Bretonnians and Dragon Prince's cry, they are a very cost-effective counter against all matter of heavy cavalry that gets thrown their way. They share the same boons of Greatswords: Armour-Piercing, good model count, decent morale. Granted only 40 armor and no shield means that if the enemy has any kind of missile unit, these guys are going to say hello to Morr very quickly. Your best frontline option if you don’t need shields.
**'''Nordland Mariners''' (Halberdiers)(ECST): The marines negate charge bonus from anything they brace against. They're also aquatic, making them good in fighting in maps with a lot of water like in lustria or on the high sea. They have also have perfect vigor while above 50% health so they can handle long melee grinds better, a straight upgrade to halberders.
*'''[[Flagellant]]s (DLC):''' Your most cost-effective tarpit. While being ''extremely'' fragile, they tie down enemy units, especially those without bonuses against infantry very effectively. Generally speaking, they work better in MP than on the campaign, where Suicide units are not worth it. Combined with an Arch-Lector or Volkmar leading your army (especially the latter, who buffs their Physical Resist up to 33%), they turn into shockingly vicious chaff killers with Bretonnian levels of charge bonus and 50% Missile resist.
**'''The Tattersouls''' (Flagellants)(ROR): Even better at tying down enemy units, having both more health and bigger unit.

===Missile Infantry===
*'''[[Free Company Militia]] (DLC):''' These guys are a very good flanking and dual-purpose unit. They have no AP or much range but they make up for it by being able to fire while moving forward and being somewhat decent in melee for missile standards. This means they can defend themselves against hounds and be able to wrap around the flank, fire into the side or back, and charge if they run out of ammo. All in all a solid unit if used well. In campaigns their versatility makes the auto-resolve AI think they're far more powerful than they actually are.
**'''Stirland's Revenge''' (Free Company Militia)(ROR): come with Stalk and Immune to psychology, along with an ok amount of AP missile damage makes them fill a better ambusher role.
*'''[[Crossbowmen]]:''' your reliable shooting unit, a long-range of 160 and shots will arc over your units. Easy to use and cost-effective if facing enemies with low armor.
**'''Stir River Patrol''' (Crossbowmen)(ECST) Vanguard crossbowmen with fire damage and slowing attacks. Excellent when fighting undead and chaos monsters, dealing big damage while giving dedicated monster slayers an opportunity to catch them.
*'''[[Handgunner]]s:''' There's a reason why the Empire's described as being built on Faith, Steel, and [[Gunpowder (Warhammer Fantasy)|Gunpowder]]. While you do need micro to be effective due to their LOS firing arcs and you usually have to babysit them, Handgunners are a key part of an Empire Army as soon as they're available. These guys are excellent at melting away heavy infantry formations, and there are few things more satisfying than seeing lines of guns mow down a group of chosen. Yeah, selling your soul to the asshole gods was a great choice schmuckos!
**'''The Silver Bullets''' (Handgunners)(ROR): Handgunners with magic guns. Specialize in picking off high-value targets that rely on Physical Resistance for defense.
**'''Gunderson's Surefires''' (Handgunners)(ECST): Essentially free company who traded their pistols for full-sized handguns. They can't fire while moving, but they can vanguard deploy and do well enough in melee.
*'''[[Archer]]s (DLC):''' With a pitiful 120 range and better options on the table, the main advantage these guys have is that they're cheap as dirt and can be recruited at tier 1. Choice #1 if you want to save money and force your opponent to fight in the rain. You will get better results from other options, which have AP or move faster, but quantity has a quality all its own.
**'''Deathjacks''' (Archers)(ROR): What other archers wished they could be. They are set apart by having the powerful combo of Stalk, Snipe, and vanguard deployment, letting them be the ultimate skirmishers, constantly lowering the health of units while the opponent is not looking.
*'''[[Huntsmen]] (DLC):''' Human waywatchers only they swapped out AP for Anti Large. These guys are great at killing low armor monsters and cav and their ability to vanguard and fire while moving makes them ungodly annoying for any army that can't catch them. You're wasting shots if you put them into infantry and don't expect much against super heavily armored monsters, but they can be a pretty useful unit against the right factions.
**'''White Wolves''' (Huntsmen)(ROR): Huntsmen that don't imminently crumble when charged by light skirmishers. Your asking if your going to pay extra so a unit of Huntsmen don't immediately high tale it and probably stop participating in the battle when a unit of hounds bites them.

===Cavalry===
*'''[[Empire Knight]]s:''' Knights were decent when the first game came out, but now they are mediocre at best. Too weak and fragile to standout and outclassed by demigryphs and reiksguard. They are fairly obsolete after the early game and haven’t held up well at all. Maybe you can get some value from the special versions but basic knights aren’t really worth using in campaign.
**'''[[Knights of the Everlasting Light]]'''(Empire Knights)(ECST): Bog-standard Knights with Magic Attacks. Counters Ethereal units and Daemons and provide a melee attack debuff to enemies.
**'''[[Knights of Morr]]'''(Empire Knights)(ECST): Knights that cause Fear and Terror. Will chase way anything that isn't fearless or unbreakable. Crap.
**'''[[Stubborn Bulls]]'''(Empire Knights)(ECST): Empire Questing knights with greatswords instead of lances. High AP cavalry, they are mediocre substitute for Demigryph Knights. The downside is you have to hold the Elector Countship of Ostland, which leaves you exposed to Norscans, Skaven, and Chaos invasions.
*'''[[Reiksguard]]:''' Upgraded Knights, same strengths, same weaknesses. If you're playing MP, take normal Knights, they do the same job for cheaper.
**'''Zintler's Reiksguard'''(Reiksguard) (ROR): Has Vanguard and Immune to Psychology. Gives a little more utility than Reiksguard.
*'''[[Knights of the Blazing Sun]]''' (DLC): Bog-standard Knights with Fire Attacks and Higher DPS values. That's all that is to them. Counters Regenerating units like many undead, tree people, and trolls. Overpriced unless you have their unique building.

===Missile Cavalry===
*'''[[Outrider]]s:''' Outriders rank amongst the best skirmish units in the game, period. Their repeater rifles deliver a tremendous amount of firepower at a decent range and they are very quick on their feet (or rather, hooves). This comes at the relative downsight that, unlike Pistoliers, they cannot fire on the move or in all 360 degrees around them, making good micro a necessity. If you want to have a reference point in how to use them to their best, try playing around with Dragoons in Total War: Empire.
*'''Outriders (Grenade Launcher):''' Screw Elven missile cav, Rotting Promethean Gunners or Norscan Missile cav, ''these'' are the definitive champions of the missile cav game and the best unit across all factions in that category. Grenade Launcher Outriders outright delete high model, low armor infantry and rack up a substantial amount of kills very quickly. Unlike other gunpowder units they can fire over obstacles. Their mobility, firepower, and high price makes them prime targets so keep them safe from missile units and skirmishers like warhounds with enough movement speed to run them down.
**'''The Bordermen''' (Outriders (Grenade Launchers))(ECST): Now with higher ratio of AP damage, letting them deal significantly more damage to high armor enemies.
*'''[[Pistolier]]s:''' If Outriders are your walking gunline, Pistoliers are your dedicated harassers. Fire on the move makes chases go very one-sided, which is their only real boon, apart from being cheap. Their missiles are fairly weak, don't pierce armour and even their ammo count isn't anything that spectacular.
**'''The Noble Sons Abroad''' (Pistoliers)(ECST): Pistoliers with better melee skills and armour. They hit almost as hard as knights on the charge, but without as much AP damage.

===Monster Cavalry===
*'''[[Demigryph Knight|Demigryph Knights]]:''' Versatile monstrous shock cavalry with better survivability than normal cavalry and good armor-piercing damage. However, they are a fairly small and expensive unit that needs to be used carefully when facing factions with AP sniper fire or their own fast, anti-large units. Compares favorably to most heavy cav + monstrous cav with the exceptions of Brettonia's perfect vigor grail knights and the ogres with their even more monstrous mournfang + crusher cavalry.
*'''Demigryph Knights (Halberds):''' Slightly more expensive demigryphs with better anti-large and armor piercing. Better against elite infantry, cavalry, and monsters and generally taken over vanilla demigryphs.
**'''The Royal Altdorf Gryphites (Demigryph Knights)(ROR):''' A step up with better melee defense and terror to rout cavalry that aren't immune to psychology.

===Chariots===
*'''[[War Wagon]] (DLC):''' These things used to be a meme unit, though with the buffs they got I suppose you could make an argument for them. AP shots are nice and the additional tankiness can help them get out of some sticky situations. Plus they can function as chariots even without the AP in melee and the guys on the back can fire while in combat, so that's nice. Outriders will be better in 90% of situations, but honestly, they aren't ''absolutely'' useless.
: They do beat pistoliers and Outriders when it comes to being harassed. High armor and you loss out on potential firepower when all the unused ammunition dies with the models, so War Wagon gives you more shooting for your buck with each wagon taking a lot of punishment before one model is lost compared to how much ammunition is lost when a cavalry unit reaches that same health margin.
*'''War Wagon (Mortar) (DLC):''' Ok, so ''this'' is a meme unit. The extra mobility doesn't make up for the missing ammo and without the guns, to fire they are a hell of a lot worse in melee. Just take normal mortars, they'll do so much better and if you plop a spear unit by them they'll be defended just fine. (still, those Results can be pending) - Changes have been made to the Mortar Wagons, now not suffering from the range, damage, and ammo nerfs this unit previously had. They're still more expensive than regular mortars, so their usefulness is still dubious, although interestingly Mortar Wagons can hide in trees, if you want to conceal your artillery's position up until the last moment.
**'''The Black Lions (War Wagon):''' (ROR) Carries Helblaster Volley Guns and sometimes can shoot over infantry. As with mortar war wagons, it's better to just take the regular artillery. They might be a lot more useful in the campaign due to their instant veterancy. Slightly more useful than the above Wagon's due to it allowing you to get better Helblaster angles.

===Artillery===
*'''[[Mortar]]:''' The first artillery unit you have access to, Mortars are very powerful against blobs of lightly-armored infantry. Their slow and indirect fire means positioning the mortar is less important than ensuring they have as much time as possible to drop explosives on the enemy. While they can be effective against archers, they are very weak to direct attacks and should be kept as far back as possible. They are also fairly inaccurate; don't expect any precision, and keep them from targeting units locked in close combat with yours unless you are targeting the ground or the enemy has blobbed up a lot against a thin line of your own troops. Their best niche is probably in siege battles; lots of enemy units clustered on walls and behind gates are easy kills for them.
**'''Sootson's Guns''' (Mortar)(ECST): Deals magic damage and does not cause friendly fire, making it perfectly safe to shoot at your own units. If you can recruit more of them, and you have not yet unlocked Helstorm Rocket Batteries or want to save money, do so. They are straight-up better than standard mortars.
*'''[[Great Cannon]]:''' Good Ol' Reliable. Will blast holes in most things it hits, thanks to its high AP damage, but it can really only hit things bigger than a house. As is traditional for Total War, you can manually aim and fire the cannon to better aim your shots. Given the nature of its cannonballs, it is surprisingly powerful when fired into the flank of enemy formations, but very inefficient if they're coming straight at the cannon. Surprisingly, they shine best in sieges, able to blast enemy towers, gates, and walls into rubble far faster than mortars. You're not going to get very many of these unless you're planning to do a lot of sieges with that army or planning to fight big, slow monsters like Dread Saurians. Vargheists and Varghulfs, while theoretically good targets, are fast enough to dodge the cannon shots and close in to kill the crew.
**'''Hammer of the Witches''' (Great Cannon)(ROR): Magic cannons that deal 100 more damage per shot. Great when facing elite units with high amounts of physical resistance or ward save.
*'''[[Helblaster Volley Gun]]:''' Fairly good in the hands of a veteran player. These are basically Gatling guns, mowing down infantry and nearly impossible for monsters and cavalry to dodge, unlike cannons. However, good positioning is needed to use them to full effect, and compared to Dwarf [[Organ Gun|Organ Guns]] they have shorter range, lower AP damage, and a slightly lower rate of fire. Get the Black Lions if you can, as their mobility really helps make the best of the Helblaster.
*'''[[Helstorm Rocket Battery]]:''' The cheese stick of the Empire on the campaign map. Given how fragile your melee line is to getting bogged down by at least decent enemy fighters like Night Goblins or Skeleton Warriors, Helstorms are your answer to massive big blobs of chaff. Sporting a ludicrous range combined with nine rockets per salvo ''per piece'' makes them perfect for thinning out hordes of Greenskins, Skaven and Undead. It has got two problems though: Its accuracy is more of a lucky guess at range, where the Helstorm follows the philosophy of "if i throw enough bombs at my enemy, one will hit them", the second and far worse one is that its damage against armoured elite infantry like Chaos Warriors or Swordmasters is subpar at best.
**'''The Sunmaker''' (Helstorm Rocket Battery) (ROR) Trades lower ammunition for significantly more Fire damage. Basically a Cruise Missile that makes Skaven think twice if they should invest in Infantry.
*'''[[Luminark of Hysh]]:''' A Giant's worst nightmare, the Luminark of Hysh deals the most damage of any artillery in Total Warhammer 1. Very accurate, on par with an Amber Spear and with very mild tracking effects, but specialized for targeting single entities. These are great for sniping high-value enemy units, like Lords, Heroes, and Dragons, especially if you can pin them down in some way. The bigger the target, the easier it is to hit with the Luminark. They also have a map-wide debuff that saps their enemy's ability to recharge their Winds of Magic and give your backline an impressive 12% ward save (resistance to physical and magical damage). However, they are near useless in melee, despite being powered by a Light wizard, and cost a lot. Look after them.
**'''Templehof Luminark''' (Luminark of Hysh)(ROR): Can cast Net of Amyntok to stop any unit within range, making it an easy target.
*'''[[Steam Tank]]:''' A heavily-armored, Unbreakable vehicle with a bow-mounted cannon and a turret-mounted steam gun for 360-degree counterattacking capability. As the cannon is mounted in an armored housing, it cannot be angled to target targets below the tank, so make sure that you place the tank on the downhill slope if you put it on high ground. The steam gun itself is fairly weak but has unlimited ammo, making it useful against blobs of low-to-medium tier infantry. The tank also has melee capabilities and a good charge, so it isn't entirely useless even after it runs out of ammunition.
**'''The Emperor's Wrath''' (Steam Tank)(ECST): Has the ability to vent hot steam, preventing enemy units from engaging it for a short time and dealing a decent leadership debuff. It explodes when destroyed, taking out a chunk of whatever was attacking it.

==Tactics==

===Campaign Strategies===
General overall Empire strategy: In Campaign, the crucial thing with the Empire is having the right army composition. Usually, you gotta have the lord and 1-3 heroes, 2-4 cavalry/chariot units, 2-4 artillery units, no more than 4-6 missile infantry units, and the rest (around a third of your army) MUST be hand-to-hand infantry units. Do NOT go overboard with artillery and missile units, always have, at the very least, 6-8 melee infantry units, and use your general and melee heroes to hold back the enemy. Get this into your head: your melee infantry is your worst weakness, but it's also your backbone. Without them, all your shiny and deathly artillery will fail miserably. Your infantry is mediocre at best: low armor and hp make them die to a breeze, with bad strength they don't kill shit, and most of all, their low morale will make them run pretty soon. The combination of all these factors makes them very unreliable. More, more unreliable than you think when you begin the battle.

First of all, you need numbers: without that, you'll lose, 100% guaranteed. Even if you win a battle with only five swordsmen units and get cocky, in the next battle you'll find they're only at half strength (Empire infantry gets decimated in each battle, even victorious ones) and you'll get your ass handed to yourself. Get Halberdiers asap, their defensive nature makes them perfect for an Empire gunline (which most of the time your army will be). You also need to place them right (spears/halberdiers in the flanks to protect against cavalry, no weak points in the battle line, no exposed flanks), and you need to support the right heroes with "Hold the line" and priests with battle prayers evenly distributed in the line, cavalry in the flanks prepared to intervene when necessary, mages to buff the line/debuff the enemy. Without a reliable wall of steel in front of them, your missiles and artillery won't have enough time to do their thing, and if the enemy gets to them, not only will they stop firing, they will suffer great (perhaps irreparable) casualties, the nearby units will get demoralized, and you'll have to dedicate a lot of resources to contain the breach, weakening the rest of your line. Do NOT let your battle line get breached!

When you progress in the game, you won't have to rely so much on the h2h infantry battle line. Your griffon/horsey general/captain/priest, with all their buffs, can contain whole units by themselves, your mages can use their flying mounts to position their spells where they are truly devastating, your high-end artillery can work miracles, and demi-gryph knights can operate independently. And yet, do not delude yourself: without a good battle line, all will be for naught. Greatswords are good but not truly great (heh), do not think they are Ironbreakers or you'll pay for it. As always, even if I repeat myself, never leave home without around a third of your army being melee infantry!

About mages, remember, with Empire the name of the game is buff/debuffs. Your little guys truly need them, do not use missile and offensive magic unless you have a lot of magic reserves and will get a lot of advantage when doing it. Later in the game, when you have a good mage with lots of magic reserves, some vortexes, either moving or immobile, and things like Comet of Cassandora can be outright devastating when the massed enemy is being contained by your battle line and you cast them right in the middle of them. But even then, only do it AFTER you have buffed/debuffed the right units and have the battle more or less under control.

About pistoliers/outriders, they only shine when you have many of them, and can shoot a unit while it's occupated pursuing your other units. This is especially true with outriders, who can't move and shoot. Lonely units won't do much, but having said that, even if they only manage to get one enemy infantry unit away from the main battle when the action takes place, they have justified their cost.

About empire knights and all their variants, remember that even with all their armor they die fast in prolonged combat, or get whittled down by the enemy fire. Never let them get too far from your battle line, where their slowness (for cavalry) can make them get surrounded and destroyed by the enemy. Their primary use is to support your infantry, not to chase enemy missiles away (although they can and should do that sometimes, of course).

To sum it all up, never forget that, in this game, Empire is the closest thing to managing a real-life army: one moment of overconfidence and many lives will be lost!

===legendary lord, Immortal Empires guide===
'''Karl Franz:''' in Immortal Empires, his starting position got a hell of a lot harder, surrounded by enemies on all sides, elector counts with a death wish, and did I mention enemies on all sides?

your first goal as always is to wipe out the rebels, take Helmgart, and start building for when Grom or tree-Hitler come knocking, the next order of business, is to rescue Middenland or Stirland, Middenland tends to die first in most cases due to Festus and Khazrak, Festus in particular must die, as he often kills Hochland and the penalty's when in negative authority are HUGE, so rush up north and kill him fast, getting an arch-lector with points in untainted can be helpful with removing the large amounts of chaos corruption there will inevitably be due to those bastards, the next step is to kill the vampires, and if luck is on your side, Stirland will have at least one settlement left or gelt is helping to hold the line, buts it's still not easy, if you're really unlucky in reaching Festus and/or Khazrak, they can leave vast portions of the Empire as ruins and you'll have to put up with Kislev and others trying to settle said ruins, and good luck getting them back, as the AI is a bitch about trading settlements, you can offer them 50k gold but there's a high chance it will fail regardless, forcing you to wage war on what should be an economic ally/meatshield for all the daemons up north.

to wrap up, Karl is surrounded by enemies on all sides, the Ai is annoying as ever, counts are suicidal and the imperial authority is what ends your campaign, as the counts die left, right, and center.

well, my good man, you have your work cut out for you, may the odds be in your favor! FOR SIGMAR!

'''Balthazar gelt:'''

'''Volkmar the grim:'''

'''Markus wulfheart:'''

===Multiplayer Strategies===
The Empire is supposed to be the quintessential Jack of all Trades faction. You are good at a multitude of strategies, but you also don't overtly specialize in anything. This flexibility allows you to be one of the more unpredictable and versatile factions in the trilogy, allowing you to use all kinds of tactics from skirmishing to gun lines to infantry rushes and heavy cav builds. Sadly, while you are good at using these multitude of tactics, every faction in the game will out match you in something. Sure, you have the tools to exploit the weaknesses of others, but if you try to out skirmish the Wood Elves or out melee Chaos you shouldn't be surprised when it goes tits up for you. Contrary to what you may believe as the main human faction, this is not a beginner friendly army and needs experience and good micro to use well. Still, you have plenty of ways to take the field and destroy your enemies. FOR SIGMAR!

*'''Beastmen''': The Beastmen are going to get into melee whether you like it or not, but you can soften them up before they get there. Bring crossbows and handguns to soften the enemy up, and some spearmen and halberdiers to absorb the enemies charge. If your micro game is strong you can do some good damage with pistoliers; but free company are to slow to keep away from the beastmen. Bringing Toddy isn't just fluffy, he's pretty great against low leadership enemies like beastmen. Don't bring normal artillery unless you can keep it totally bubble-wrapped with infantry; a steam tank will usually work better than a couple of cannons. You should bring at least one Luminark to deal with enemy monsters, just keep it safe from flanking attacks.

*'''Bretonnia''': Your cavalry is good, but the Bretonnians will win in the cycle-charge game. Halberdiers are your best friends here; they can split knights apart with their high AP and anti-large damage. Keep some handguns and hellblasters to shoot the knights down when they break away from melee, and bring some outriders to delete the enemy elite.

*'''Daemons of Chaos''':

*'''Chaos Dwarfs''': Your best bet is to go very wide, with a lot of cheap spearmen for your frontline. Chaos Dwarf elite infantry is very expensive and they'll usually rely on a lot of "Labourer" chaff units to cover the field. Your spears will hold fine against them. You probably want to bring at least one Great Cannon or other artillery unit to keep the Dawi-Zharr. Magma Cannons are good at burning down artillery crews but your cannons get four shots to their one. For real killing power though you want to exploit your superior mobility. Bring Outriders, Knights, Demigryphs, and War Wagons. Almost all of them will do fine in melee against Wolf Raiders and can quickly reposition to try and avoid Chaos Dwarf gunlines. The best counter against you in this case is Bull centaurs but Bull Centaurs are slow for monstrous cavalry and can be easily kited by War Wagons. Leave your Handgunners at home; they're too stationary and will get blasted to pieces by the many horrifying artillery pieces the Chaos Dwarfs can roll out.

*'''Chaos Warriors''': Chaos generally don't bring their elite infantry options here as they're very vulnerable to missiles and most state troops are unarmored to start with. As such, Greatswords can be a great support tool for your frontline. Two of them can help take out most Chaos infantry aside from Chosen with support from spears. Aside from that, your options generally revolve around whether you want to pick Franz or Volkmar. If you pick Franz to deal with monsters, go for mobility. Two outriders can tear most of the Chaos army apart and you can use Empire knights to protect them from lighter maurader and hound units. Be sure to bring a life wizard to keep Franz alive. If you want Volkmar to guarantee an infantry win, a few handgunners can be brought to pick apart Shaggoths and a couple cav units and a light wizard with nets can be used to support them.

*'''Dark Elves''': This is one of the few match ups were Lance Demigryphs are better than the Halberd version. Due to the amount of range AP the Dark Elves bring the shield is super important to help keep them alive, and since Dark Elves don't rely much on heavy cav these guys are better for cycle charging infantry. Aside from that, your main issue is going to be dealing with all the mobile range. Pistolers trade very cost effectively against Dark Elf ranged cav and Markus can help make sure they stay in place with his nets. Handgunners are also good to get rid of their scarier units like Morathi and Malekith. If you want a lord that can actually fight if needed, Volkmar is great with some heavy cav as long as you can protect your ranged pieces. Generally Dark Elves like to go on the offensive, so you're the one who will have to turtle up with an unbreakable frontline and try to pick off all of the good targets that you can.

*'''Dwarfs''': Dwarves are the Empire turned up to eleven, which makes sense considering how much the Empire learned from the dwarves. Their artillery is better than yours, their infantry are stronger, and their lack of magic is made up for with their innate magic resistance. The Empire is faster, which can help, but high Dwarf leadership and melee defense means cycle-charging isn't a surefire strategy. Generally, you'll want to separate dwarf units, especially their ranged units from their melee units, and flank the former while occupying the latter's attention with a line of disposable Greatswords and the like. Huntsmen outrange dwarf ranged units, and can be used to good effect when skirmishing, while Outriders' high AP and speed make them very effective on larger maps. Forget Pistoliers, Archers, Swordsmen, and Spearmen; their low AP makes them useless against everything except Slayers.

*'''Empire''': As above, separate front- and backline units and take out the artillery. The Empire's variety of wizards presents a moderate challenge, requiring you to pay much more attention to positioning and movement of your ranged units if you want to get rid of them without excessive losses.

*'''Grand Cathay''':

*'''Greenskins''': Are you into kiting? If not, tough luck. Orcs just straight up walk all over your melee troops and Black Orcs and Trolls bring enough AP damage on their own to give your elite infantry a very hard time. You'll need to tarpit their slow, lubering advance long enough for your missle troops and artillery to shoot them to pieces. Helblasters and Hellstorm Rocket Batteries work wonders to thin out the green tide and Outriders can be a pain in the Greenskins arse to deal with since nothing they have is fast enough to catch them... until their ammo runs out, that is. You can also get good mileage out of Demigryphs, greenskins don't have anti-charge units and their cavalry will lose to yours.

*'''High Elves''': THe only other roster to be as generalistic as yours, and believe it or not, you actually have a sizeable advantage. For one, none of your otherwise flimsy infantry is actually that bad against HE baseline options like Rangers or Spearmen due to bigger units and higher HP. Second, your artillery can seriously ruin the day of any units the High Elves can bring. And finally, any of your options is much more cost-effective in comparison; you can bring two units of Swordsmen for the price of one unit of HE Spearmen, and even one unit of Swordsmen can handily win against them. Their elite units have "shoot me" written all over them for your artillery and missile units, a request you should oblige.

*'''Khorne''':

*'''Kislev''':

*'''Lizardmen''': Use your artillery to devastate their infantry, use your gunners to hunt down their monsters, use your infantry only as a last resort if the Lizardmen close the distance. If they have Terradons, prioritize accordingly; Riders can be ignored, FireLeech Bolas can't. If you can shut down their speedier units (like Cold One Riders, Carnosaurs or Horned Ones), your cavalry can get some solid work done through some well placed cycle charges while keeping two steps ahead of the plodding lizards. In general, you'll want to have your forces in a relatively lose formation; between the Slann, Skink Priests and various AoE abilities at their beck and call, you don't want to lose half of your frontline to a Banishment or Chain Lightning cast, something they'll be able to toss about relatively frequently.

*'''Norsca''': The traditional foe of the Empire is vulnerable to being flanked, their access to Hounds not withstanding. Cavalry can be put to good use against Norscans as they close in on your forces, though the many units equipped with big shields in their army mean you'll have to micromanage your archers and gunners in battle. Your biggest challenge will be dealing with and clearing out the Norscan's faster units before their slower infantry and monsters crash against your lines, as many of their faster units are going to be very good at dodging artillery fire, and indeed at closing on your artillery crews.

*'''Nurgle''':

*'''Ogre Kingdoms''': This should be an easy matchup if you play it right. With Huntsmen, Markus Wulfheart, Great cannons, and Luminarks combined with the Ogres' relative lack of armor and shields, they will quickly be reduced to big, chunky corpses. As long as you watch out for Gnoblar Trappers, your missile cavalry will have a field day gunning down Ogres. Consider targeting Ogre artillery with yours due to the amount of damage they can do from afar and up close. Bring an anti-large frontline, but support it when melee is joined to make winning the close fight possible.

*'''Skaven''': Weapons Teams will slaughter your infantry if you let them. Use your artillery to outrange them, and use your heroes to clear out mobs of Stormvermin and Bombardiers. Empire infantry, ranged and melee, are much better than theirs, but beware their summoning abilities lest they destroy your firing line. Empire cavalry, particularly Pistoliers, can be useful if you don't have many heroes, but large Skaven units can bog them down easily after the latest cavalry/mass changes.

*'''Slaanesh''':

*'''Tomb Kings''': Target the Tomb Kings. Everything else, bar the Sphinxes and Scorpions, are a distraction and waste of ammunition. Use your infantry to bog them down and keep firing.

*'''Vampire Coast''': As with all undead factions, you should try to take down their leader as soon as you can. Leave your unarmored footmen at home; anyone without a shield will be shot to death in short order. Bring plenty of long range firepower and at least one or two Luminarks to take down the enemy monsters (prioritize Necrofex Colossi first, then Leviathans, then everything else). Pistoliers are a good choice for this army; most of the enemy infantry units have no armour to speak of. When picking magic support there really isn't a wrong answer for this matchup, but anything with a vortex will do great against large hordes of slow-moving enemies.

*'''Tzeentch''':

*'''Vampire Counts''': Target the Vampire Lords. If you can't, avoid wasting your precious ranged units' ammunition on chaff like skeletons and zombies and focus on the high-value targets: Heroes, Corpse Carts, Wraiths, and monsters. Don't bunch up your infantry too much; Vampire lores of magic are devastating to infantry blobs. Your best strategy is getting a Fire Wizard or 3 on pegasi, as the Vampire Counts have no ranged units.

*'''Wood Elves''': Their archers will outrange your gunpowder units, but they don't have anything that can ''quite'' contest your artillery. Thin their ranks with some Mortars or Helstorm Rocket Batteries and have Shielded Spearmen or Halberdiers screen against their cavalry or larger Forest Spirits. Speaking of which, the Luminarch of Hysh does ''disgusting'' damage to any (Ancient) Treemen stumbling across the battlefield, while a Bright Wizard can make kindling of any Dryads or Tree Kin on the field. Once they get closer, light them up with all manner of firepower. A majority of their roster is unarmored and generally unshielded; they'll take heavy losses. Take a care against their elite infantry; though squishy, they are veritable blenders who will make short work of your soldiers should they make it into melee.

===Domination===

General Tier Rank: '''A'''

As a jack of all trades faction and the way domination works you can reliably 'summon in' answers to whatever your opponent does on the fly. The empires roster is decently mobile and you have lots of options to counter-act your opponents strategy wether it's calling in demigrphys if the lizardman player brings in some dinos or doubling down on artillery you have a great ability to adapt on the fly and win the match

[[Category:Total Warhammer]] {{Total War Warhammer Tactics}}

Chain Weapon

2023-06-11T20:07:07Z

2A02:1810:4E2C:A900:DC0E:597F:F427:CBEB:

[[File:Chainsword06.jpg|180px|right|thumb|A typically poor rendition of a chainsword - as you can see, the housing surrounds the teeth, which would interfere with penetration (but would allow it to parry). Still dangerous though.]]

{{Topquote|Problems? '''Problems?''' There is no problem I cannot solve with this...|Commander Mad Chainsaw Johnson of the [[White Scars]], [[White Dwarf|White Dwarf 93]]}}

A Chain weapon is a fuck-awesome melee weapon, heavily used by [[Imperium|Imperial]] forces, although variants are fielded by the [[Eldar]], [[Ork]]s, and [[Chaos Space Marines]].

Apparently in the 41st Millennium, chainsaws have been re-purposed for hacking down things/aliens/people instead of simply harvesting lumber. By far the most common Chain weapon is the chainsword.

As its name implies, the chainsword is a bladed weapon with a rotating chainsaw blade in-between, that's powered by a motor mounted on the hilt and activated with a trigger on the grip. Of course, the sheer manliness in this weapon makes it pretty damn heavy, so it's actually really fucking awesome. But since almost all the users of it have some combination of power armor, bionics, or natural strength to swing them around, the weight is a lot less of an issue. More likely it’s due to lightweight materials because it’s tens of millennia into the future.

Although the chainsword is issued to virtually all forces of the [[Imperium]], it is most famous with the [[Space Marines|Spehss mahreens]] who widely use the chainsword as the primary weapon of their assault troops and veteran soldiers.

The standard chainsword used to have the same rules as any other close-combat weapon. Which is dumb, considering most of the fluff describes it as cutting through armour with ease, even Terminator armour, with some additional effort. [[Derp|Because a giant chainsaw does as much damage as a combat knife.]] 8e changed it up a bit, though- while it still doesn't do more damage than a basic close combat weapon, it does grant a bonus attack. This (along with its low point cost) makes it a good choice of melee weapon when the quantity of your attacks matters more than their quality (e.g. against [[Hormagaunt]] swarms and mobs of [[Ork]] Boyz).

'''[[TL;DR]]: The Chainsword is the second most manly weapon ever created, right behind the [[Power weapon#Power Fist|Power Fist]].'''

==Imperial Variants==
Over a dozen Chain weapon variants have been developed by the Imperium of Man. It should be noted however, that the list is not exclusively for the Imperium, as Chaos factions also use some of these into their armoury. It just that the Imperium are the biggest users of them. Here are some examples:

===Chainblade===
[[File:ChainBladeBolter.jpg|200px|right|thumb|Chainblade]]

The smallest known Chainweapon.

These weapons are small enough to be considered as an attachment to most rifles. As such it is a smaller Chain bayonet that is attached to a Bolter and utilized as a close-combat weapon during assaults.

Although, to be honest, it seems more practical to just have a large, sharpened serrated blade than a gas-guzzling weapon that will become useless once it runs out of fuel, and seeing how small the weapon (and thus, fuel supply) is, its gonna run out of fuel relatively quickly. This statement rings true. Back in the [[Great Crusade]] and [[Horus Heresy]] days, it was expected to see half the squad of a [[Tactical Squad|tactical team]] be seen wielding these microchainsaws on their [[Astartes Boltgun|boltguns]]. Like, seriously, they were ''the most common'' chain weapon in those times. Fuckers were everywhere.

However, by the 41st millennium, finding any sensible individual wielding these things is beyond rare. Here in /tg/, there were wide speculations on why the Chainblade is rarely seen in use. The most common theory is that doctrines simply changed. Back in the old days, the [[Beakie]]s were treated more like secondary armies and line breakers. Ergo, it was expected that Space Marines to engage in the most harshest of clusterfucks ''en masse'', so the need for a melee attachment for a bolter made sense in the likely scenario a Space Marine were to fall under a moshpit of CQC violence. Ironically enough, the Space Marines acted ''more'' like the Imperium's sledgehammer than the [[Solar Auxilia]] did during those times. Like, believe it or not, but the 31st millennium faced ''more'' CQC assaults than the modern period as most Xenos at that time liked to go all-in-your-face, so there was a sound reasoning for these things for close encounters of which there were many. When the Horus Heresy came under full swing, the CQC moshpit became even ''more'' intense as various worlds started to fortify the fuck out of their defences, so the Astartes had to go in close and personal against other Astartes and the Solar Auxillia all dressed in [[Void Armour]] and [[Reinforced Void Armour]].

However, with the break up of the legions, the Astartes went from [[Powerfist]] to scalpel. With the implementation of [[Assault Squad|assault marines]], the need for the Chainblade drastically decreased as (Most) Astartes became elite ranged shock troopers. You are not going to decapitate the enemy's leadership with a mini-chainsaw now, would you? So the doctrines changed, and the Chainblade was phased out due to growing impracticalities in a changed environment. The Imperium no longer needs to fight rival Xenos empires and large traitor legions, but stragglers, insurgents and minor Xenos threats. Moreover, anything the Chanblade can do, a regular [[Basic Close Combat Weapons#Astartes Combat Knife|Astartes Knife]] can do it much better, for the knife has a far bigger reach, simpler to make, far more flexible and versatile, orders of magnitude more quieter, and does not rely on fuel to be useful.

Basically it was the lancer assault rifle from Gears of War before Gears of War even existed.

<gallery>
File:Cataphractii.jpg|Cataphractii Terminator with a chainbladed Combi-Flamer.
</gallery>

===Butcher's Cleaver===
[[File:Butcher's_Cleaver.PNG|200px|right|thumb|Butcher's Cleaver]]
A Butcher's Cleaver is essentially the Chain Cleaver's little brother. Like their bigger brother, the Butcher's Cleaver is only wielded by the Corpse Guild of [[Necromunda]], and, if they went completely loco, the [[Corpse Grinder Cults]].

The weapon itself heavily resembles that of the Chain Cleaver, although it is slimmer and functions somewhat like a tomahawk axe with a motor attached in contrast to the Chain Cleaver's battleaxe; being lighter and easier to handle at the expanse of not offering the same levels of oomph in terms of power. In a sense, they are kind of like the Chainsword to the Chain Cleaver's Heavy Chainsword.

On the tabletop, they are the cheaper and lighter version of the Butcher’s Chain Cleaver and it delivers the same Strength but reduced AP and Damage. Still pretty good though.
===Chain Cleaver===
[[File:BCC.PNG|200px|right|thumb|Chain Cleaver]]
A weapon used by the "[[Heresy|I can't believe they're not a]] [[Khorne|Khornate]] [[Heresy|warband yet!]]". A Chain Cleaver is the Butcher's Cleaver's bigger brother and is a pretty brutal chain weapon often wielded either single-handed or dual-wielded. Due to its small size, one could do multiple attacks in quick succession. Wielding two of these guarantees your transformation into a walking meat blender on two legs.

The Corpse Grinder Cult gang is the aforementioned 'NOT-Khornate' faction in [[Necromunda]] and the biggest user of these things. We are not sure whether the [[World Eaters]] have used these, although they would most likely be a popular choice if given the chance.

On tabletop, they are probably the best of the Corpse Grinders’ arsenal. They’ll give any fighter the high strength and high volume of attacks that they need to succeed, all while staying under budget.

===Heavy Chain Cleaver===
[[File:Chain_Cleaver.JPG|200px|right|thumb|Heavy Chain Cleaver]]
The biggest of the lot when it comes to the Chain Cleaver family. The Heavy Chain Cleaver like its little brothers, is used exclusively by the Corpse Guild and the [[Corpse Grinder Cults]]. The definitely ''NOT''-[[Khorne|Khornate cults]], [[bullshit|we ''swear''.]]

Now although it ''may'' look similar to the regular old Chain Cleaver, the Heavy Chain Cleaver as its name implies, is slightly bigger, but much bulkier and heavier variant of the normal Chain Cleaver; replacing its standard chain teeth and motor with a suped-up one filled with denser cutting teeth.

Whilst the Butcher's Cleaver is meant to cut up lean meat and the Chain Cleaver can cut a limb or two. If you want something to cut a dude in half, bone and all, than you call the ''Heavy'' Chain Cleaver to do the job. Now, these things are still a ''one-handed'' weapon that can be dual-wielded. Although standard safety protocol requires two-hands for safe handling, something like the Corpse Grinder Cults on the other hand, couldn't give two shits about OSHA compliance, and dual-wields them like [[awesome|chads]].

On the tabletop, they are the heaviest-hitting one-hander in the game, the Heavy Chain Cleaver does work. It hits better and harder than the Chain Cleaver, but we’re not sure it’s worth the price tag. However, there is definitely an argument for it. One of these things will turn a [[Cutter]] or [[Skinner]] into a true monster.

===Pulverizers===
[[File:Pulverizors.JPG|200px|right|thumb|Pulverizers]]
Non-[[Khorne|Khornate]] chainaxes. Pulverizers are a makeshift chain weapon utilized by those particularly blood thirsty hive gangers in [[Hive World|Hive Worlds]] such as [[Necromunda]]. It is a beefy and brutal weapon that can be duel-wielded for twice the choppa. In a sense, they are kind of like a bigger version of the Chain Cleavers.

On Necromunda only [[House Goliath]] are big enough to wield these en-masse, and only [[Stimmer]]s are strong enough to dual-wield them.

On tabletop, the Pulverizer certainly packs a punch. However, the paired Pulverizers are really where it’s at, as a Stimmer will get 8 attacks on the charge with a couple of those bad boys, you turn into a bunch of Khornate Berserkers.
{{Clear}}

===Axe-Rake===
[[File:AxeRake.jpg|200px|right|thumb|Axe-Rake]]
A very interesting and unique weapon that is seldom seen.

Axe-rakes are a heavy multi-purpose weapon and tool used within the Imperium and by the forces of Chaos. They feature a heavy axehead, sometimes replaced with a chain-axe assembly and curved bill-hook or barb at the back. So whilst not all Axe-rakes are chain weapons, a good majority of them are.

They are used in mines, smeltors, foundries and work gangs and can also assist in climbing over obstacles or forcing open doors and locks by using the bill-hook like a giant crowbar. An almost universal symbol in the Imperium for labour and a hive world's manual workforce and is often rendered as an icon both in industrial architecture and livery on most hive world guilds and the Vervun Primary Hive [[Commissar|Commissariat.]]

They saw use during the [[Horus Heresy]] by the [[Ashen Circle]] of the [[Word Bearers]] Legion. These nasty-ass blades were used to drag down victims with its bill-hook/barb and topple graven idols and false icons for the Word Beaers' pyres.

===Chainfist===
[[image:Chainfist.jpg|200px|right|thumb|Chainfist]]
Intended to assist Terminators' not stellar mobility when involved in boarding actions, the Chainfist is a [[Power weapon|Power Fist]] that incorporates a powerful chainsaw blade for the purposes of slicing through armored bulkheads. The weapon is commonly used by Terminators both as a CQC weapon and a convenient tool to cut themselves a way through the average [[Space Hulk]]'s too small doors/walls/ceilings/floors... during boarding actions. Of course, since it can penetrate thick metal with little trouble, it's also often used for ripping open enemy vehicles and bunkers. These are also seen among [[Imperial Navy]] breachers for that very same purpose.

The reason it's so effective is simple: the powerfist's energy field also encompasses the chainblade. That's right, the chainfist effectively marries a chainsword and power fist. Remember how a regular power sword cuts most stuff like a hot knife through butter? Now bring a chainsaw with hot knives for teeth into this butter world, ''wear it like a glove'' and that's how a chainfist feels. That's just plain scary. If anything, it's like hitting a target with a power sword at [[Fist of the North Star|40 strikes per second]], so that the powerfield weakens the target and then the teeth hack it away. The alternative is having a static piece of metal that is still cutting, but just not as efficiently.

The easiest way to use a chainfist in combat is to wield it like a Tonfa, as it's mounted just under the left wrist parallel to the arm...except for the versions with the saw coming over or out of the knuckle plate on the back of the hand. Or the ones that [[Awesome|replace the middle finger with the saw]] (not joking).

<gallery>
Image:TerminatorChainfistZoomed.png
image:SpaceMarineHeroChainfist.png|<center>Heresy-era</center>
image:CataphractiiFists.jpg
</gallery>

===Chainsaw===
[[File:Chainsaw_Pit_Slave.JPG|200px|right|thumb|Chainsaw]]
The good'ole Chainsaw. You know'em, you love'em. After 40,000 years, the design has basically stayed the same.

Used for an extensive variety of jobs across all strata of society, Chainsaws are also a popular choice of weapon for the [[Pit Slave|Pit Fighters]] of the deathmatches to be found in many lawless parts of the Imperium, most notably in the underhives of [[Hive World]]s such as [[Necromunda]].

Traditionally they are grafted onto the stump of an arm, or as in the case of the famous slave leader Bull Gorg onto the stumps of both (which makes you wonder how he eats and uses the toilet...[[Slaanesh|or how he faps]]). However, the infamous Pit Fighter Harkan Vore had one which replaced [[Wat|his lower jaw]], which one wonders how the proverbial fuck [[Derp|does he even eat?]] Wait his name is "Vore", so I guess the answer is one we rather not think about.

For cases where chainsaws aren't being carried around or grafted onto someone's body, they also see use in being attached to a [[Sentinel]]. Most variants of the sentinel can be armed with a sentinel chainsaw but you'll mostly see them on [[Catachan]]-Pattern Scout Sentinels, which make some sense as they are experts on jungle warfare. The Sentinel's relatively small and maneuverable body make it good for such occasions but they still need some clearance, that's why you need something to cut through all that fauna [[Rape | or give some poor fucker a new hole]].

Sentinel chainsaws pair well with [[flamer]]s especially when given to a Armored Sentinel. This humble combo turns them into quick and durable shock troops. So basically, if you want, you can give the IG they're own knock-off [[Dreadnought]] but one that actually walks instead of waddles, give them this combo (if you wanna get technical it can be seen as the Imperial Guard's version of a [[Invictor Tactical Warsuit]] and [[Paragon Warsuit]] but who gives a shit about those things).

Older sentinel chainsaws looked more like large hedge trimmers but the newer ones replace them with the much cooler chainsaw arms.

<gallery>
File:CatachanSentinel.gif | Catachan-Pattern Sentinel with a chainsaw attachment to compliment the flamer.
File:CadiaStands_ScoutSentinel_Preview.jpg
</gallery>

===Chainsword===
[[File:Imperial_Chainsword.jpg|200px|right|thumb|Chainsword]]
A chainsword is just a chainsaw with a sword grip. Most versions make use of monomolecular-edged or otherwise razor sharp teeth.

Like many examples of human invention, the chainsword’s many variants seem to have their roots in the shrouded heresies of the Dark Age of Technology. Some in /tg/ like to speculate that it was some AdMech Priest who had mistaken a weirdly designed Chainsaw for a sword, unfortunately official fluff dictates that it saw consistent use in the armored fists of techno-barbarians during the Age of Strife, and among the Emperor’s own armies during his [[Thunder Warriors]]’ conquest of Terra during the Unification Wars.

But whilst Techpriests debate on the origin of the Chainsword, a particularly amusing theory surface that states it was an [[Heresy|inspiration stolen from]] [[Eldar|an alien race,]] [[War in Heaven|in a war that may never be remembered.]] [[Troll|If this theorem ever bears fruit, it is distinctly possible that the galaxy’s first wielders of chainswords were the prissy armored warriors of the ancient Eldar,]] [[Not As Planned|not us Humans.]] Although this bears little weight as chain weapons and bolt weapons were created to combat powered and semi-powered armor common to techno-barbarians ([[Derp|which the Emperor replaced with mesh and then flak armor even though semi-powered armor at least was common enough for everyone’s wargear to revolve around fighting people wearing it]]).

There are multiple varieties of Chainsword such as the '''Ironfang Chainsword''', which is a variant of the chainsword created to allow human heretics to approximate the deadly blows of a Legion chainsword, this variant features a thick, bladed area with chained teeth nearly twice the width of an ordinary chainsword, and powered by a backpack-mounted fuel supply. Its greater tearing strength and weighted nose allow it to deal viciously violent heavy slashing blows. Needless to say, this weapon is heavy - 12 kilograms in weight, complete with power supply - and unbalanced, ie. a very heavy ''regular'' chainsaw. It would tear things apart like nobodies business in melee... if it can make it there.

Chainsword actually appears in [[Total War: WARHAMMER|Total War: WARHAMMER III]], as it can be obtained in the Realm of Khorne, where it makes the bearer UNBREAKABLE (because who cares about Vargheists or Daemons when you have a Chainsword?) and obviously deals a shit-ton of AP. This is certainly very unexpected, as 40K weapons only appeared in Fantasy in a very old lore where universes were linked together. This is, most likely, an Easter egg, and it disappears the next time you enter the Warp. and <s>a first hint towards the probable Total War 40k</s> gives us hope that we may one day get a [[Dawn Of War]] Reboot with CA's budget, just like how they rebooted [[Halo|Halo Wars]] after seizing it from Ensemble Studio's cold, dead hands.

<gallery>
File:PreacherChainsword.png|Preacher armed with a Chainsword
File:ThunderEdgeChainsword.jpg|Horus Heresy-era Chainsword
File:BattleSisterBulletinCharacter--ChainswordPowerpack.jpg| [[Battle Sister Squad |Battle Sister]]'s power pack with a sheathed chainsword.
File:WHFestLiveBlog-Sisters-Swords.jpg|
File:CrossedChainswords.jpg | Crossed Chainswords
</gallery>

===Frost Blade===
[[File:FrostBlade.jpg|200px|right|thumb|Frost Blade]]

A unique Chainsword and possibly one of the only ones that could actually cut anything worth a damn rather than bludgeoning the enemies of man to death. The Frost Blade is yet, [[Mary Sue|another special weapon and equipment exclusive to the]] [[Space Wolves]].

Like the Frost Axe, each blade is hand-crafted by a Master [[Iron Priest]], and many incorporate the diamond-hard fangs of the Fenrisian Ice Kraken. They are highly sought after and in the skilled hands of a Space Marine they can be comparable in effect to most Power Weapons. Naturally, this means kraken hunting for teeth for the Adeptus Astartes at large will never happen. Not squandering resources is heresy. Like giving chainswords to every Marine and not just Assault and Veterans. Madness, what do you think they are, super-human?

Also for the record: Kraken (well squids anyway) do have 'teeth', they're just in the arms rather the mouth.

In the legends of the chapter, the finest Frost Blades are made of ice harvested from the heart of a glacier, and then [[Wat|tempered inside a Kraken's belly.]]

Notable mostly for both looking totally [[Awesome|badass]] and being the only chainsword that looks like an actual sword-chainsaw instead of chainsaw-sword.

===Heavy Chainblade/Chainsword===
[[File:Heavy_Chainblade_HH.JPG|200px|right|thumb|Heavy Chainsword]]
The Eviscerator's pussy brother, the Heavy Chainblade is a massive chainsword, significantly larger than one of the standard chainswords but far weaker than an actual Eviscerator, possibly because [[Heresy|it was meant more for construction than combat]]. This also made it to it's combat stats, instead of the Eviscerator's manly SX2, AP2 with Armourbane, it's a weak S+2 AP4, with no additional bonuses (and being two-handed as well, so forget using it to get another attack). About the only thing it has on the Eviscerator is that it's not so huge that it's unwieldy.

Being used mainly by the Mechanicum in the Great Crusade and Horus Heresy, it's unsurprising these seem to have mostly fallen out of favour in the 41st millennium, given how everyone seems to have swapped to the Eviscerator.

Not to be confused with the similarly named "Heavy Chainsword", used by the Legions Astartes, an even wimpier version that shares the same profile except for being AP 5 instead of AP 4. These also seem to have fallen out of favour when the Eviscerator rolled around, much to nobody's surprise.

<gallery>
Image:Twin_Handed_Chainsword_1024x1024.JPG|Another Heavy Chainsword.
Image:WHFestLiveBlog-Sisters-Swords.jpg
Image:UltramarinesAssaultSquad.png
</gallery>

===Eviscerator===
[[File:Evisercator.jpg|200px|right|thumb|Eviscerator]]
Chainsword but ECKS BAWKS HUEG. Used by the Ecclesiarchy's priests and by the [[Sisters Repentia]] of the [[Sisters of Battle]] (as well as Chapter Master [[Gabriel Seth|Gabriel 'IN THE BALLS' Seth]]). Most recently however, Eviscerators have found their way into the hand of 7E assault marine sergeants, because meltabombs just weren't enough.

The Eviscerator is twice the size of a regular chainsword and so heavy that a normal soldier will need to wield it using both hands. The Eviscerator might also incorporate an [[exterminator]], a portable flame unit that will not only help it breach armor, but also scare the fuck out of any normal man upon seeing a whacked up priest/nun swinging a fucking huge flaming sword-chainsaw. The Eviscerator is also extra effective against armored units.

In some works the Eviscerator is described as having a disruptor field weaker than those of energy weapons, which still helps carving through ceramite.

<gallery>
Image:Catalogue_Eviscerator.jpg|The classic chainsaw variant
image:RepentiaEvisceratorZoomed.png|REPENT MOTHERFUCKER!
File:KlovisTheRedeemerPict.jpg|Pict of Klovis' Eviscerator and Exterimnator
File:KlovisExterminator.jpg
File:RedemptionistExterminator3.jpg
</gallery>

===Chain Spear===
[[File:Chain_Spear.PNG|200px|right|thumb|Chain Spear]]

Another long-range Chainweapon.

Similarly to the chain glaive, this weapon combines reach with lethality, mounting a chainsaw-bladed length at the end of a long haft, ensuring that jabs and thrusts can tear open flesh with the lightest touch whilst keeping the wielder out of harm's way, in contrast to the chain glaive whose curved blade and hilt aims for a more slashing and cutting motion to dismember enemies from a distance.

According to ''Tome of Blood'', some variants actually sport the [[Wat|sharpened teeth of the bearer's former victims as the cutting edges, which are enough to cause even the slightest hit to become a spray of blood and torn flesh.]] Considering where it comes from and the description, this screams [[Khorne]].

===Chain Lance===
[[File:Chain_Lance.PNG|250px|right|thumb|Chain Lance]]
The Chain Spears even ''bigger brother''.

The Chain Lance is an uncommon chain weapon that is only useful when two-handed or mounted on a cavalry unit. Chain Lances offers even greater range than its smaller cousin at the expanse of ease of use. Whilst this makes the weapon incredibly powerful on a charge, its large size makes it impractical for anything else.

They are only seen wielded by the [[Ash Waste Nomads]], specifically the [[Nomad Chieftan]] and the [[Dustback Helamite Rider]]s.

On the tabletop, the crunch seem to match the fluff as it is a versatile but very unwieldy weapon. Lance weapons gain +1 strength on the drive-by or charge, which is particularly nasty paired with the versatile trait. So use it as a powerful hit-and-run weapon.
<gallery>
Chain_Lance_Mounted.PNG
</gallery>

===Dreadnought Chainfist===
[[File:DreadCF.jpg|200px|right|thumb|Dreadnought Chainfist]]

A Chainfist but fuckhueg.

In the Imperium, a Dreadnought Chainfist can exclusively be found attached to the [[Castraferrum Dreadnought|Ironclad Dreadnought]], although more vanilla Dreadnoughts are able to wield one if given the proper modifications. Unlike the smaller Chainfist which are used to open blastdoors, the Dreadnoughts use theirs to open tank hulls. This arm consists of a massive chainsaw shaped to fit a dreadnought power fist. This is a devastating weapon capable of tearing apart infantry and light armor.

The Forces of Chaos also makes use of Dreadnought-sized Chainfists, more specifically the force of [[Khorne]] due to its brutal blood-grinding method of destruction. It is not uncommon to see a [[World Eaters Berserker Dreadnought|World Eaters or other Khornate dreadnought]] equipped with dual Chainfists for maximum [[RIP AND TEAR]].

It suffers from the standard issue of any close combat weapon not used by infantry, that being the Dreadnought it's mounted on being too large to actually hit anything with it realistically.

In 8th edition, the Dreadnought Chainfist deals 4 damage per attack but retains the high AP and loses the penalty to hit which makes it great against fighting whatever poor MEQs, GEQs, TEQs and light vehicles that gets in its way. Although against larger walkers, it starts to obviously suffer.
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===Reaper Chain-Cleaver===
[[File:Reaper_Chain-Cleaver.JPG|200px|right|thumb|Reaper Chain-Cleaver]]

The kid brother of the much larger Reaper Chainsword. The Reaper Chain-Cleaver is still a relatively large Chain Weapon carried by the combat walkers of the Imperial Knights, particularly the smallest class of Knights known as the [[Armiger Knight Warglaive]]s. The Reaper Chain-cleaver is a saw-toothed weapon similar to but smaller than its much larger relative that mangles metal and gnaws flesh to ruin with each shuddering impact.

Unlike say, the Dreadnought Chainfist, the Reaper Chain-Cleaver is much better at fighting due to the more flexible joint placement of the Knight Armigers. That, and the fact that Knight Armigers are relatively slim and not as clunky, awkward and bulky; traits that usually characterize the servo-motors of Space Marine Dreadnoughts, specifically [[METAL BOXES|the more boxy design]] of the 41st Millennium.

To give credit where credit is due. The Chain-Cleaver ''actually'' looks like a proper cleaver. More specifically, it bears some resemblance to a Chinese cleaver.

On tabletop, the current Imperial Knight codex from 8th edition gives the Reaper Chain-Cleaver a weapon with two attack options: Strike and Sweep. Strike is Sx2/AP-3/3D and Sweep S-/AP-2/1D but doubles the amount of hit rolls you can make with it. So this gives the Armiger some very nice added adaptability in their close combat.

===Reaper Chainfist===
[[File:Reaper_Chainfist_of_the_Knight_Acheron.jpg|200px|right|thumb|Reaper Chainfist]]

A chainfist but really [[Rape|ECKS BAWKS HUEG]].

The Reaper Chainfist is a weapon used by the [[Cerastus Knight Acheron]]. Usually carried on the Knight's right weapon arm, the Reaper Chainfist is employed alongside the Acheron's Acheron-Pattern Flame Cannons as a weapon of extermination used to inspire fear in the foe.

The Reaper Chainfist is actually a set of two Chain Weapons linked together, with each one spinning in opposite directions to maximize damage. The blades are capable of tearing through both armor and fortified walls with ease.

The weapon also features a built-in set of twin-linked [[Heavy Bolter]]s to be used against infantry when the Knight needs to conserve fuel for its [[Acheron Flame Cannon]]; these Bolters are often used as a last resort or when the Knight really wants something dead in its tracks.

{{clear}}

===Reaper Chainsword===
[[image:ReaperChainsword2.jpg|200px|right|thumb|Reaper Chainsword]]

The standard superheavy weapon in the Chain Weaponry, the Reaper Chainsword is the main weapon of most models of [[Imperial Knight]] used in the [[Imperial Knight#Questoris Knight Patterns|Questoris family]]. Unlike most Chainweapons you see here, it was originally designed as a Logging device for feudal colonists (You know, like modern chainsaws); though only the height of three men, the Reaper's adamantine teeth are no less deadly and thus, also works incredibly well as a massive melee weapon.

The Chainsword can be swung with all the power of the Knight's servo-motors; the Reaper is capable of cleaving through practically anything, from the thick ferrocrete walls of a defensive bunker and capable of carving open a Super-Heavy Tank with a single blow. Too bad that the Knight it's mounted on is a giant, its arms are laughably short, and it can't lean forward, meaning that realistically it's never going to hit anything smaller than another Knight, and still have trouble with that, unless they're basically hugging.

<gallery>
image:ReaperChainswordZoomed.png
</gallery>

{{Clear}}

===Titan Chainfist===
[[File:Rtchainfist1.jpg|200px|right|thumb|Titan Chainfist]]

The big daddy-o of the Chainfist family. The Titan Chainfist takes the form of a large chainsaw attachment like the Chainfist, but on a gigantic scale. Thanks to the available power from the Titan's massive plasma reactor, Titan-grade Chainfists are also equipped with a secondary [[Siege Melta Array|Melta Array]], to soften up the target while cutting through it. With how large the Titan is, how small it's hands are and how short the Chainfist is, it's never going to hit anything short of another Titan, and it's most likely going to have a hard time landing a hit on those too.

The [[Reaver Battle Titan]] is the biggest user of these weapons.

Crunchwise, they are similiar to the [[Power Weapon#Titan Power Fist|Titan Power Fist]], at Sx2 AP-5 10 D. However it can also cause -1 to hit. However, any to wound roll of 6 where a VEHICLE, MONSTER, or BUILDING is targeted deals 2D6 extra mortal wounds. Remember that void shields do not work against melee attacks, so against Titans and Titan-equivalents that lack melee weapons those Mortal Wounds can be a a big deal.

{{clear}}

===Desolator Chainsword===
[[File:DesolatorChainsword.jpg|200px|right|thumb|Desolator Chainsword]]
[[Dick|The Big Dick]] of chainweapons. Large enough to make [[Khorne]] proud.

The appropriately named [[Rape|Desolator Chainsword]] is one of the two primary weapons of the [[Warmaster Iconoclast Titan]]. This motherfuckest of [[RIP AND TEAR]] are skyscraper-sized Chainswords used to make a Mega-Choppa feel limp-dicked in comparison.

Of course, this along with the [[Miscellaneous Weapons#Krius Siege Drill|Krius Siege Drill]] begs the question on why even give a slow-moving, stupidly large target weapons that they could only engage at close range. Even by the stupid reputation of the Imperium, [[Derp|this is already stretching the limit on practicality, even by ''40k standards''.]] With how heavy the - you know - '''Heavy Battle Titan''' is, it is much more feasible for the Imperium go the [[Emperor Battle Titan]] way of mounting more guns and turning it into a fix-point superheavy artillery walker.

This impracticality is further compounded by its...bizarre design choice. I mean look at it. [[Wat|What idiot thought it was a good idea to fuse the scabbard with the weapon's guide bar.]] [[Stupid|You literally have a giant close-combat weapon that can't even cut worth shit because that weird scabbard/guide bar design is blocking the chainsword from you know,]] [[EPIC FAIL|'''''cutting'''''.]]

[[Fail|That's GW design 'quality' for you.]]

==Chaos Variants==
Chaos use a overwhelmingly amount of chain weapons in contrast to power weapons. The majority of these users are [[Khorne|Khornate warbands]] and seeing how GW has a [[Waifu|unhealthy obsession with Khorne,]] you can see why. The majority of chain weapons of Chaos originally came from the Imperium, so it is unsurprising to see some old Imperial worlds and factions to still incorporate these weapons in its armories. Its just that the force of Chaos has re-appropriated it for Chaos needs.

===Tzaangor Chainsword===
[[File:Tzaangor_Blades.JPG|200px|right|thumb|Tzaangor Chainswords]]
Unique Chainswords made specifically for the [[Beastmen (40k)#Tzaangors|Tzaangors]] of the Thousand Sons.

These blades are warped by the sorcerous and psychic nature of their home planet of Sortiarius. With their savage nature, a Tzaangor would hack apart even power armor with sheer ferocious speed from their blades.

On tabletop, Tzaangor Chainswords are basically your typical Chainswords, its just best to stick with your Tzaangor Blades as it is just that but with an additional AP-1. No need to switch for a largely inferior weapon.

{{Clear}}

===Chainaxe===
[[image:Chainaxe.jpg|right|200px|thumb|Chainaxe]]
Imagine doomguy but a weapon. Yes, Warhammer has chainsaw axes, as insane it sounds. The custom weapon of [[Khorne|Khornate]] champions, the Chainaxe was a fairly common weapon among Imperial troops pre-[[Horus Heresy|heresy]]. It's basically a huge axe with a powerful chainsaw as a blade. Pre-heresy it was practically standard issue among the [[World Eaters]]. The sheer weight of the axe and the fact that most Khorne Chaos Marine champions are super strong and completely fucking nuts ensures these will tear through most infantry armor.

It's wielded by non-Khornate Chaos Marines as well, due to the greater damage it inflicts, but mostly because of the showers of gore they call "wounds" - represented in 40k rules by being AP4, a straight upgrade from a regular chainsword and the woe of anyone not wearing power armour. Among Imperial forces, a chain-axe is most likely to be seen in the hands of a [[Space Wolves|Space Wolf]] or a [[Raven Guard]] - the former due to the fact that they just don't give a flying fuck that it might associate them with Chaos, and the latter due to the fact that they mostly have older equipment due to infrequent resupplies. They are also very common among [[Flesh Tearers]] because they basically [[Heresy|already are]] a Khornate cult.

<gallery>
Image:KhornateChainaxeZoomed.png
Image:ReaverAxe.jpg|Great Crusade era
Image:Chain_Axe.jpg
</gallery>

===Excoriator Chainaxe===
[[image:E-ChainAxe.JPG|right|250px|thumb|Excoriator Chainaxe]]
The Excoriator Chainaxe is one of a group of weapons called the '''Caedere Weapons''' and used exclusively by the [[World Eaters]] [[Rampager]]s. Caedere Weapons is less of a distinct family of weapons and more of a name denoting their gladiatorial origins from [[Nuceria]]TM. Akin to how only the province of Champagne is allowed to call their sparkling wine Champagne and no one else, only with more [[RIP AND TEAR]] of course.

This Chainaxe is a heavy, two-handed Chainaxe that should be more appropriately called a ''Chain Glaive'' than a Chainaxe. They are hefty looking weapons that are meant to combine the superior reach of a spear/halberd with the bone-shattering rending power of a Chainaxe. The Excoriator Chainaxe, therefore, fills a niche for an armour-piercing, long-range, melee chain weapon.

Crunchwise, unfortunately, the fluff doesn't really match the crunch. At S+2 AP3 with ''Two-Handed, Shred, Unwieldy'' and ''Murderous Strike (5+).'' The Strength bump and Murderous Strike now makes it more dangerous than either a lightning claw or power maul, but Unwieldy still means that you're swinging this at I1, well after anyone else. ''Shred/Murderous Strike'' is nice, but most models with multiple wounds have 2+ saves, whereas this is the only Caedere weapon without some way of getting to AP2. Think carefully.

===Chainscythe===
[[File:ChainscytheMatriarch2.png|200px|right|thumb|Chainscythe]]

A even more unconventional and unwieldy weapon than the Power Scythe.

The Chainscythe is both a incredibly rare and extremely difficult to wield. It is telling that only one unit from oldschool [[Necromunda]] was seen carrying this thing around.
It is only seen wielded by the [[Spyrer]]s wearing the [[Matriarch Hunting Rig]], this variant of the chainglaive mounts the blade at a horizontal angle to the tip of the shaft.

Seriously though, how the hell do you fight with this thing? Not only does it share the same stupid profile of all chainweapons (That is the metal piece mounted on the blades are interfering with its cutting power), but it also shares the same awkward handle of a scythe. Try and hit someone with that thing, there is a reason why warscythes have their blades turned 90 degrees upwards like halberd to increase chances of it actually hitting anything. Well, when people did use scythes to kill someone it was almost always by burying the pointy end deep into the target, rather than by fiddling with the blade to make a cut. Now picture this, the whole blade of the Chainscythe inside a person, that you then get to rev gushing the flesh inside and depending on the squishiness of the target even cutting messily OUT of the body, rather than in.

Certain [[Death Guard]] [[Deathshroud|Deathshrouds]] are known to use a special hybrid variant of a Power Scythe with chain teeth. Similar to the Chainfist, these specially modified Manreaper Scythes combine the disruptive nature of a power weapon with the raw and savage cutting power of a chain weapon. [[Mortarion|Ol'Morty]]'s own personal Manreaper ''"Silence"'' also incorporates chain teeth, but at a lesser extant.

<gallery>
image:ChainscytheMatriarch.png|The only person insane enough to use this as a weapon but as an agricultural tool it is ideal
File:Chainscythe.PNG
Image:Manreaper_Chain-Power_Scythe_Hybrid.PNG|Death Guard Power/Chainscythe hybrid.
</gallery>

===Chain Glaive===
[[image:Chain_Glaive.PNG|200px|right|thumb|Chain Glaive]]

Also known as Chain Halberds, the Chainglaive is an evolution of the Chainaxe, giving it a longer blade and haft allowing for wide, sweeping strikes capable of rending power armour without much trouble. It's used extensively by Vanguard Marines and Chaos close-combat specialists. An ancient design by modern standards, it's by no means common, and sees use primarily with the traitor legions due to this (particularly with the [[Night Lords]], who had always favored its use).

They are also used by Rough Riders as a secondary or even primary weapon due to the weapon's reach and strength. These weapons come in a startling variety based on the sundry Forge Worlds and eras in which they were manufactured, but all are extremely deadly.

Forge World doesn't seem to know what they want these to look like. Most of them seem to be actual glaives, but there's at least some models with axe-like ones or [[What|giant chainswords]].

<gallery>
Chain_Glaive_NL.JPG|[[Awesome|Sick-ass]] looking Chain Glaive from a Night Lords [[Praetor (Space Marine)|Praetor]].
</gallery>

===Chain Hammer===
[[File:Chain_Hammer.PNG|200px|right|thumb|Chain Hammer]]

Another rare and obscure Chainweapon.

Chainaxe not insane enough for you? [[Black Crusade]] introduces the chain Hammer, a massive, normally two-handed weapon shaped into either a maul outfitted with multiple rows of spinning metal teeth on the club-like head, or four chainaxe heads fused into a shape of a maul which can both rip apart flesh and smash bone into pulp with the brutal impact of this insane weapon.

Chain hammers are known to be used by orks and the pit brutes of Kurse in the Screaming Vortex. Powered versions capable of splitting Power Armour were also wielded by the Accusators of the Black Judges.

It is as ridiculous as it sounds.

===Chaos Dreadnought Chainfist===
[[FIle:Chaos_DredChainfist.jpg|200px|right|thumb|Chaos Dreadnought Chainfist]]

A Chainaxe upscaled to a Dreadnought for all your Khornate needs.

The Chaos Dreadnought Chainfist is similar to the one found on Imperial Castraferrum Pattern Dreadnoughts such as the Ironclad Dreadnought. The Chaos variant is covered in dark, runic symbols of the Dark Tongue and macabre ornamentation.

These weapons are favoured by Chaos Space Marines who follow the [[Chaos God]] [[Khorne]]. [[World Eaters Berserker Dreadnought|Khornate Berzerker Dreadnoughts]] usually are armed with two Dreadnought Chainfists, one on each of its weapon arms. The weapon is outfitted with a hull-mounted twin-linked [[Astartes Boltgun|Bolter]], a [[Combi-Bolter]], a [[Heavy Flamer]], or in the case of captured or recently turned Dreadnoughts, a [[Storm Bolter]].

The Chaos version can be differentiated by its more pronounced cutting teeth.

The [[Contemptor Dreadnought]] also has its own variant. The weapon looks as if a standard Asatartes Chainsword has been used to replace one of the Power Fist's fingers, unlike the Dreadnought Chain Fist used by the Castraferrum Pattern Dreadnought, which takes up the entire weapon arm. Like most Contemptor Dreadnought Close Combat Weapons the Contemptor Chainfist is also armed with a [[Combi-Bolter]] slotted within its palm.

<gallery>
Image:Chaos_Contempt_Chainfist.jpg|Contemptor variant
</gallery>

===Chaos Dreadnought Pincer Claw===
[[File:Pincer_Claw_Dread.png|200px|right|thumb|Chaos Dreadnought Pincer Claw]]

A very oldschool weapon that shows its age.

The Chaos Dreadnought Pincer Claw is a variant of the Dreadnought Chainfist, and consists of a pincer-like double Chain Weapon. These weapons are known to be found on Chaos Dreadnoughts that are dedicated to the Chaos God [[Slaanesh]], such as [[Emperor's Children Sonic Dreadnought|Sonic Dreadnoughts.]]

The shape of the weapon indicates a heavy influence from Slaaneshi Daemon Weapons. Seeing how pincer weapons are as pronounced in Slaanesh as Chainaxes are the staple of Khorne, this isn't that surprising.

Thus, it could be assume that the Emperor's Children merely took inspiration to their new master and fashioned their Dreadnoughts with a weapon that makes them visually closer to the Daemons of Slaanesh. [[Grimdark|Of course, being a Dreadnought, they are incapable of feeling the emotions and pleasure whilst stuck perpetually inside a tank.]] [[Troll|So the Dreadnought ends up raging in despair...much to the amusement of Slaanesh he/her/itself.]]

The Pincer Claw is designed to grab its prey and slowly mutilate its victims, however as an actual weapon for warfare, it is relatively poor. It is unable to effectively parry other like-minded weapons and its design makes it poor as both a cutting and bludgeoning weapon.

No wonder why this thing has not seen the light of day.

===Khornate Assault Claw===
[[File:Khornate_Assault_Claw.png|200px|right|thumb|Khornate Assault Claw]]

In no way should it be confused with the [[Drop Pod#Kharybdis Assault Claw|Kharybdis Assault Claw.]]

The Chaos Dreadnought Chainfist given a even more Khornate upgrade.

The Khornate Assault Claw is a variant of the standard Contemptor Claw, and is used by [[Chaos Contemptor Dreadnought|Chaos Contemptor Pattern Dreadnoughts]] dedicated to the Chaos God of blood and war, Khorne. The Khornate Assault Claw replaces the standard Power Claw's fingers with miniature Chain Weapons, making it especially devastating against infantry.

Like most Contemptor Dreadnought Close Combat Weapons the Contemptor Chain Fist is also armed with a Combi-Bolter slotted within its palm. The weapon could also be outfitted with a twin-linked Bolter during the Great Crusade and Horus Heresy-era, or in the case of recently captured or reequipped Dreadnoughts a Storm Bolter.

The Khornate Assault Claw looks like a much more up-to-date and practical weapon than the Slaaneshi Dreadnought Pincer Claw.

===Reaper Chaintalon===
[[File:Reaper_Chaintalon.JPG|200px|right|thumb|Reaper Chaintalon]]
The Reaper Chaintalon is a new weapon shown on March 24, 2022.

These things are the primary weapon for the Chaos Knights. Specifically for the smaller [[Chaos Knight War Dog|War Dogs]] such as the [[War Dog Knight Karnivore]] or the [[War Dog Knight Stalker]], so they can use it for sweeping away lesser chaff.

The Chaintalon is essentially the sibling of the Armiger's Reaper Chain-Cleaver, although in terms of its shape and performance, it is more accurate to call it as a miniature Reaper Chainsword. On the tabletop, it acts exactly the same as its loyalist counterpart. It has two modes of attack: Strike and Sweep. Strike is Sx2/AP-3/3D and Sweep S-/AP-2/1D but doubles the amount of hit rolls you can make with it.

{{Clear}}

===Brass Scorpion Pincer Claw===
[[File:Pincer_Claws.JPG|200px|right|thumb|Brass Scorpion Pincer Claw]]

The giant Pincer Claws found on the [[Brass Scorpion]].

Each of these claws are fully capable of tearing armored vehicles into pieces and wiping out entire infantry squads in one fell sweep. The creature's claws are protected on their outer sides by large Warp-forged alloy shields.

When the beast places its claws in front of itself, these shields are able to protect its entire body from harm. The Claws also feature three large in-built Chain Weapons, allowing them to cause even more damage during combat. There also exist variants of the Brass Scorpion outfitted with massive spinning blades instead of pincers.

===Great Cleaver of Khorne===
[[File:Great_Cleaver_of_Khorne.JPG|200px|right|thumb|Great Cleaver of Khorne]]

[[Daemon Weapon#Axe of Khorne|Axe of Khorne]] on acid or a Chain Axe that has overfed on growth hormones.

A Great Cleaver of Khorne is a Daemon Weapon in the form of a massive warp-forged Chainaxe that is wielded by the [[Lord of Skulls]] and [[Kytan]] Daemon Engine. Like the Lord of Skulls that wields it, the Great Cleaver of Khorne is festooned with the remains of its victims, their skulls forever trapped within. The weapon is large enough that the Lord of Skulls can make use of it as easily as if it was a normal-sized melee weapon, and is capable of tearing apart tanks as if they were human heads. The Great Cleaver is fully capable of cutting off the legs of TITANS and taking out entire groups of heavy infantry. It is a weapon forged from murder and rage -- and it delivers the very same to its victims.

When activated, the Great Cleaver will erupt/ripple with eldritch power, the teeth rotating so fast as to become a blurred edge.

This is [[RIP AND TEAR]] INCARNATE!

==Eldar Variants==
===Scorpion Chainsword===
[[image:Eldar_Scorpion_Chainsword.png|right|200px|thumb|Scorpion Chainsword]]
An Eldar variant of the Chainsword fielded by the [[Striking Scorpions]]. It's like the Imperial Chainsword but incorporates advanced equipment that increases the wielder's strength and incorporates a sleeker, less bulky design.

There's been fluff that suggests they are actually a lot more advanced than Imperial chainswords, consisting of a heavily serrated 41st millennium mono-molecular blade which doesn't whirl around most of the time. Rather, upon hitting an opponent, and the blade gets stuck in their body/armor, THAT's when it goes all chainsaw, ripping armor and people apart and ensuring that the blade doesn't ever get stuck in someone; it'll either go through them or at least rip whatever it's stuck in enough to be pulled out, while also being a lot quieter since the motor's not constantly humming.

<gallery>
image:ScorpionSwordZoomed.png
</gallery>

===Chainsabre===
[[File:Dragon's_Tooth_Chainsaber.jpg|200px|right|thumb|Chainsabre, ''Dragon's Tooth'']]
One of the Scorpion Exarch's unique variation of the Scorpion Chainsword. Chainsabres are unique weaponry used by Striking Scorpion Exarchs. These Chainswords are paired with ancient gauntlets which incorporate twin-linked [[Shuriken Catapult|Shuriken Pistols.]] Exarchs who use these weapons train to wield two of them at once, allowing them to level an unrelenting storm of attacks upon their opponent.

On the tabletop 8th edition, the Chainsabres are two one-handed chain weapons that can [[Fist_of_the_North_Star|land a truly staggering amount of blows on a target]]. In melee they function the exact same as the Scorpion Chainsword, though these will grant another melee attack and have the Shuriken Pistol profile for your ranged attacks. Considered the most versatile of the bunch.

<gallery>
Image:Striking_scorpions_exarchs_1_5.jpg|Chainsabre with Shuriken Pistol attatchment
</gallery>

===Biting Blade===
[[File:Biting_Blade.jpg|200px|right|thumb|Biting Blade]]
One of the Scorpion Exarch's unique variation of the Scorpion Chainsword. Essentially the Eldar copy of the Eviscerator. Biting Blades are large, two-handed, long-bladed Chainswords reminiscent of the massive Eviscerators used by zealots within the Imperium. However, where Imperial Eviscerators are heavy, noisy machines, Biting Blades are slender and quiet, but no less deadly for their relatively light weight. The advanced monomolecular-edged teeth of the blade tear through flesh as though it were parchment and equally shred bone and armor, easily cleaving a man-size target in two.

On the tabletop, the Biting Blade is a massive two-handed weapon whose effectiveness increases as a target is hit. Basically it is a two handed Chainsword that bumps up to S+2 (S5) AP-1 and 2 D compared to the run of the mill Scorpion Chainsword. The least expensive of the Exarch's selections, but it also costs him both his pistol and Scorpion Chainsword to use.

==Ork Variants==
===Chain Choppa===
[[image:Chainchoppa.jpg|200px|right|thumb|Chain Choppa]]
The Chain Choppa is the Ork version of the chainsword. The weapon is a handheld chainsaw (though it sometimes takes the form of a sword or axe) used for almost anything. Really, you name it. In a pinch it can stand in for anything ranging from a weapon to a household tool.

Regular garden variety [[Ork_Boy|Ork Boyz]] rarely have these weapons, while richer Orks like the [[Warboss]] or a [[Nob]] might have it because it's killy and flash. Many are simply war trophies picked up from loyalist and traitor Space Marines.

<gallery>
image:ChainChoppaZoomed.png
</gallery>

{{Clear}}

===Big Chain Choppa===
[[File:OrkChainAxe.jpg|200px|right|thumb|Big Chain Choppa]]
The Chain Hammer of the Ork Horde.

Sometimes simply called the Ork Chainaxe. It is basically a Big Choppa with a motor system attached to it. Like the smaller Chain Choppa, certain Orks prefer this over the average Big Choppa due to the amount or carnage it can spew out.

The sheer size and relative complexity in making one means that only the biggest, strongest and wealthiest Orks could purchase one, like [[Nob]]s, [[Meganobz|Meganob]]s, [[Warboss|Warbosses]] and [[Warlordz|Warlords]]. Like most Ork weapons, there are no standardization for the Big Chain Choppa.
{{clear}}

===Crusha===
[[File:OrkCrusha.jpg|200px|right|thumb|Crusha]]

''[[Derp|Not to be confused with the similarly named]] [[Miscellaneous Klose Kombat Weapons#Krusha|Krusha]]''

The Ork's Dreadnought Chainfist.

An oversized set of mechanical Chain Klaws which may or may not be the unholy lovechild of a Dread Klaw and a Chain Choppa.

The Crushas are basically the little brother of the Klaw of Gork/Mork and are meant to rip apart armored opponents with its pneumatic strength and powered piercing pincers. Whether they are actually Power Weapons is not known. What is known is that they feature a built-in Chain Weapon on the Klaws which can enable the Deff Dread to both capture and rip apart enemies at the same time.

Despite this, they are grouped all under the [[Killa Kan]]/[[Deff Dred]] Close Combat Weapons and thus, all share the same profile of a Dread Klaw/Kan Klaw (Depending on the walker using them). [[Derp|Which means that this non-Power Weapons share the same function as an ''actual'' Power Weapon.]] Although at the very least, the Crusha could at least be hand waved to function like the Chainfist.

===Mega-Choppa===
[[File:Mega-Choppa.PNG|200px|right|thumb|Mega-Choppa]]
The Orks saw the Imperium's Titan-sized Chainfists and proceeded to one-up them in both [[/d/|length, size and ''girth''.]]

A giant ECKSBAWKSHUEG Chainsword that are mounted only on biggest Ork walkers - from [[Stompa]]s to [[Gargant]]s and to see one in action is to witness a truly apocalyptic scene. These Mega-Choppas are designed to grind and rip apart enemy Titans with several swoops.

On tabletop, the Mega-Choppa is a Stompa's go-to carving weapon. It comes with 2 attack profiles. The first one is '''Smash''' which double's a Stompa's strength. Has a -5 AP. Causes 6 wounds per hit. Double S is inconsequential as there is nothing with T10. 6 wounds guaranteed are nice if you need exactly that, but more attacks are usually better. So you might want to use it for -5AP mostly.

The second attack profile is '''Slash''' which is only user-Strength, with a somehow lower AP than a Power Klaw (-2 as opposed to a klaw's -3), does D3 wounds per hit instead of the Smash's 6, BUT it lets you make 3 hit rolls for each Attack.
{{clear}}

==Notable Chainweapons==
[[File:Torchlight chainswords by LaithArkham.jpg|left|thumb|300px|The mêlée weaponry of the 41st millennium offer a variety of implements for violently lacerating the opposition]]

'''Storm's Teeth''' - Take [[Berserk|Guts']] DragonSlayer, turn it into a Chainsword, and then make it Bigger so only a [[Primarch]] can use it. Thats Storm's Teeth. Used by [[Rogal Dorn]] himself, it was said to be Dorn's favored weapon and is what he used against <s>[[Alpharius]]</s> some random Legionary. He also broke it when he found the Emperor barely alive after his duel with Horus, but that's fine since its remains would be used to create the sword used by the Black Templars High Marshal.

'''The Wolf Blade''' - Not actually a space wolf weapon, it was another great bloody chainsword used by [[Lion El'Jonson]]. It was an ancient relic weapon found in the halls of "The Order" on Caliban but it was too big for anyone other than the Lion to use ([[Just as Planned|begs the question why anyone would make a sword to big for a human but just right for a 10' demi-god without any knowledge of the primarchs]]). He would swap between using this and the Lions Sword during the Crusade and Heresy.

'''Frostfang''' - An ancient chainsword used by [[Ragnar Blackmane]]. The techniques used to make it were kept a secret by Fergus Forgrim to his deathbed so no one knows how it was made, because it's not like that could have been important or helpful later, right?

'''Gorefather and Gorechild''' - <s>THE BEST WEAPONS IN THE WHOLE OF 40K</s> {{BLAM}} {{BLAM}} {{BLAM|''DOUBLE HERESY!''}}Two chainaxes used by [[Angron]] during the [[Great Crusade]] and [[Horus Heresy]]. The teeth of these weapons came from a [[Awesome|MOTHERFUCKING MICA-DRAGON]], and are lubricated by [[Khorne|BLOOD]] (these weapons are so metal, they bring envy to the [[Iron Hands]] and [[Iron Warriors]]). Gorechild is currently being used by that [[Kharn|Swell guy]], and Gorefather <s>is nowhere to be seen, but it might show up again</s> <s>was sadly destroyed on Armatura during the Horus Heresy</s> is a relic you can give to [[your dudes]]!!

'''Spinegrinder''' - A fuck-off massive chainaxe that Angron uses nowadays. Was forged by a hell forge seeking his favor, only for their very creation to be turned against them as big A really wanted to test it out and had a perfectly viable pool of bodies to sacrifice to see how good it really was. Said forge is no longer around, by the way.

'''Teeth of Terra''' - Origin unknown, and with a tendency to show up in possession of many different chapters and disappear just as quickly, the Teeth of Terra is an ancient chainsword with obsidian teeth. It strikes hard and deep and allows the bearer to swing in huge, sweeping arcs.

'''Blood Reaver''' - An Eviscerator wielded by [[Gabriel Seth]]. Because nothing says [[rip and tear]] like a fuckheug chainsword, and the Flesh Tearers are masters of that particular craft.

{{clear}}

==Gallery==
<gallery>
DornStorm'sTeeth.png|<center>''Storm's Teeth''</center>
BlackmaneFrostfang.png|<center>''Frostfang''</center>
AngronGoreFatherChild.png|<center>''Gorefather & Gorechild''</center>
GoreChild.jpg|<center>''Gorechild'' (Present)</center>
GabrielSethBloodReaver.png|<center>''Blood Reaver''</center>
</gallery>

==Video Links==
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5gj8pAN7Y7E DIY Chainsword, Blood Angel variant]

{{Template:40k-Imperial-Weapons}}
{{40k-GenestealerCults-Weapons}}
{{40k-Chaos-Weapons}}
{{40k-Eldar-Weapons}}
{{40k-Ork-Weapons}}
[[Category:Warhammer 40,000]][[Category:Imperial]][[Category:Chaos]][[Category:Eldar]][[Category:Orks]]

Cerebore

2023-06-11T20:04:41Z

2A02:1810:4E2C:A900:DC0E:597F:F427:CBEB:

[[File:Cerebore.jpg|250px|right|thumb|A Cerebore unloading its cargo.]]
The '''Cerebore''' is a large [[Tyranid]] organism equipped with sacs to transport smaller creatures into battle, similar to the roles fulfilled by the [[Haruspex]]... [[Wat|which is like the complete opposite in reality]], as it is closer to the [[Tervigon]] than anything else. It is equipped with a [[exoskeleton|hardened exoskeleton]] on its back for protection and [[Tyranid_Bio-Weapons#Ripper Tentacles|multiple tentacles]] to fend off attackers.

Cerebore seem to be more sluggish in both appearance and movement; albeit more armoured compared to the walking uterus that is the Tervigon, so their battlefield roles could be that of a heavy duty troop transport carrier that may carry more units than the Tervigon, at the expense of speed/maneuverability and the ability to birth out [[Termagaunt|Gaunts]] like [[Lasgun|flashlights]].

==Tabletop Fan-Rules==
===7th edition===
A Cerebore is a large Tyranid organism specifically created to transport smaller creatures safely into battle. It's an organic tank transport thought to have been spawned after the Tyranids encountered Imperial forces, but instead of armour plating it has a hardened exoskeleton reinforced like none other, able to resist Anti-tank rounds that would leave any normal tank a smoking wreck.

It is able to transport smaller Tyranids due to small protective sacs under its carapace. These sacs contain a sort of nutrient bio-gruel that keeps the Tyranids alive for longer than normal periods of time. In addition this gruel increases the cellular repair rate of any on board Tyranids, repairing damaged limbs, strengthening carapace, and even goes as far as to energize the organisms mind, making it think and act far faster than normal. This is thought as a way to keep Tyranids alive behind enemy lines if anything were to happen to the main force, these odd Bio-creatures act as temporary rally points for beaten creatures.

Though it is a transport it is far from defenseless. The Cerebore has a mass of short but strong whip-like appendages along both sides to repel any attacks, in addition it has a pair of shovel like talons at its head used to smash through ruins and even enemies, ensuring nothing slows it from its goal of disgorging it's deadly cargo.

A Cerebore is taken as a Fast attack choice for any Tyranid army.

Cerebore- 250 pts.

WS|BS|S|T|W|I|A|Ld|Sv
3 |3 |6 |6 |5 |2 |3 |8 |2+

Composition:
- 1 Cerebore

Unit Type:
-Gargantuan creature

Weapons and Biomorphs:
- Armoured shell
- Stinger salvo
- Scything talons
- Lash whips
- Thrasher tendrils

Special rules:
- Instinctive behavior- Feed
- Transport creature
- Move through cover
- Fearless

Transport creature:
A Cerebore can carry a single unit of up to 20 Infantry models. When disembarking/Embarking the Cerebore is treated as an open-topped vehicle for access point purposes. When embarked a unit cannot be affected by any shots or psychic abilities against the Cerebore. If the Cerebore is killed the unit inside treats it as a Vehicle-Explodes result, in addition they must take a strength check, if failed the unit is considered at Initiative 1 unit the Tyranid players next turn, if the test is passed the unit is unaffected and disembarks as normal.

Thrasher tendrils:
These large club like tendrils are used to beat off or get away from any unit trying to assault the Cerebore, they also help the Cerebore perform great bursts of speed.

Any unit wishing to assault a Cerebore counts as assaulting through difficult terrain. In addition once a game a Cerebore may use these tendrils to propel itself forward in a small burst of speed, roll a D6 and it moves that may extra inches during its movement. This does not affect an on board units ability to disembark.

Read more: http://thetyranidhive.proboards.com/thread/41965/custom-rules-dactylis-cerebore#ixzz4Mo0AcW27

===8th edition===
A cerebore is a single model. It is armed with a Stinger salvo, a single pair of monstrous Scything talons, an array of Lash whips and a futher array of Thrasher tendrils.

{| class=wikitable
|- valign=top
! Name !! M !! WS !! BS !! S !! T !! W !! A !! Ld !! Sv !! Points !! PP
|-
| Cerebore || * || * || 5+ || 8 || 8 || 16 || * || 9 || 2+ || 250 || 10
|}

{| class=wikitable
|- valign=top
! Remaining W !! M !! WS !! A
|-
| 9-16+ || 12" || 3+ || 6
|-
| 5-8 || 6" || 4+ || D6
|-
| 1-4 || 3" || 5+ || 1
|}

{| class=wikitable
|- valign=top
! Melee Weapon !! Range !! Type !! S !! AP !! D !! Abilities
|-
| Monstrous scything talons || Melee || Melee || +4 || -3 || 2D3 || Hit rolls of 1 for this weapon may be re-rolled.
|-
| Lash whip pods || Melee || Melee || User || -1 || 1 || Make 2 hit rolls for each attack made with this weapon, instead of 1.
|-
| Thrasher tendrils || Melee || Melee || +2 || -2 || D3 || You may not use this weapon once you have used the Thrasher Tendrils ability. You may make D3 additional attacks with this weapon if the bearer charged this turn.
|-
| Stinger salvo || Assault 6 || 18" || 5 || -1 || 1 || -
|}

Abilities:
*Instinctive behaviour:

*Thrasher Tendrils:
**Once per battle at the beginning of your turn, this model may exhaust its Thrasher Tendrils to provide an extra boost of speed. If you activate this ability this model advances and charges 3D6" discarding the lowest value, and may charge after advancing. Any models embarked inside it may disembark after it has advanced and may still charge themselves with a +1 to their charge distances. Once your turn finished however, this model suffers D6 mortal wounds from overexerting itself and ripping itself to pieces.

*Living transport: Unlike the tervigon, the cerebor does not birth its cargo. They are in fact stored within itself before the battle, allowing it to carry more interesting varieties of tyranid which would be too complicated and large for itself to produce within itself.
**This model may transport up to 20 '''<HIVE FLEET>''' '''GENESTEALERS''', '''TERMAGAUNTS''' or '''HORMAGAUNTS''', or a unit of up to 6 '''HIVE GUARD''', '''TYRANT GUARD''' or '''TYRANID WARRIORS'''.

Keywords:
*Faction: <Hive Fleet>, Faction: Tyranids, Heavy Support, Monster, Cerebore

[[Category:Warhammer 40,000]]
[[Category:Xenos]]
[[Category:Tyranid]]
[[Category:Megafauna]]

{{Template:Tyranids-Creatures}}

Cerberus Heavy Tank Destroyer

2023-06-11T20:03:58Z

2A02:1810:4E2C:A900:DC0E:597F:F427:CBEB:

[[File:Sm-cerberus.jpg|right|350px|thumb|WHAT IS IT!!!? I CAN'T HEAR YOU OVER THE INSANE AMOUNTS OF STUFF I'M BLOWING UP!!!...OH SHIT IT DEFLEC!!!... {{BLAM|'''KABOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!!!!!!}}]]

The '''Cerberus Heavy Tank Destroyer''' is a super-heavy tank used by the Space Marine Legions during the [[Great Crusade]] and [[Horus Heresy]]. It is built with the chassis of the [[Spartan Assault Tank]], but instead of twenty-five Marines, it carries a twin-linked [[Neutron Laser Projector]] (the same weapon as the [[Valdor Tank Hunter]]) and the attendant arc reactor and radiation shielding -- in fact, the extra structure makes it even tougher than the Spartan.

*'''Length:''' 12.4m; approx
*'''Mass:''' 174 tonnes
*'''Crew:''' 3 crew
*'''Max Speed:''' 35kph
==Overview==
Apparently, the [[Adeptus Mechanicus|Mechanicus]] went to a lot of trouble to get the plans for the neutron laser -- they had to recover wreckage "at great cost" from a battlefield dating to the [[Dark Age of Technology]] in the Hyades system (a star cluster well-known for its appearance in [[Cthulhu Mythos|The King In Yellow]], by the way) and reverse-engineer the neutron laser from that. Still, it did provide an alternative to the bulkier [[turbo-laser]] weapons, with the "bonus" of risking backlash to the vehicle if the beam bounces off the target.

Miraculously enough, the Neutron Laser Projector is not a lost technology, given Valdor tanks can still be produced in a scant few Forge Worlds like [[Imperial Armour#Fires of Cyraxus|Cyraxus II]]. The knowledge to manufacture the Spartan chassis though? It's kaput.
Naturally, the few tanks who survived the [[Horus Heresy]] are treasured relics of a [[Chapter]]'s armoury. The [[Exorcists]] for example, had not fielded their Cerberus for more than a millennia before the Ashen War, and have yet to awaken it ever since.

== istory==
The Cerberus model was created by [[Forge World]] as part of their [[Horus Heresy]] line, specifically as part of the release of [[The Horus Heresy Book One - Betrayal]]. It later received rules for use in regular [[Warhammer 40,000]] games in [[Imperial Armour Volume 2 Second Edition - War Machines of the Adeptus Astartes]]. As part of the [[Horus Heresy]] reboot, a new plastic version has been revealed.

{{clear}}
{{Iron Hands}}
{{Marines-Forces}}
{{Chaos Space Marines}}

{{40k-Imperial-Vehicles}}
{{40k-Imperial-Ships}}

Centurion Squad

2023-06-11T20:02:57Z

2A02:1810:4E2C:A900:DC0E:597F:F427:CBEB:

:''[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_zSxQnZ3TM8 Hear me out. A Space Marine... inside of a Space Marine.]''
[[File:Centurion6.jpg|300px|thumb|right|At least it looks better than the [[Dreadknight]]...]]
Hey, you! Tired of just one heavy bolter? Wish to crush your foes with their own armour? Wonder why your devastator sergeant doesn't have any heavy weapons? Crave [[Anime|GIANT FUCKING DRILLS]]? Then the new centurion warsuit is for you!

==Centurion Squads==
A centurion squad is a new (relatively) type of [[Space Marines|space marine]] squad available with the release of [[Warhammer 40,000 6th edition|6th edition]], which are a real pain in the ass to paint. [[Centurion Armour|Centurion armour]] is a warsuit whose [[STC]] printout was discovered after the [[Age of Apostasy]]. After getting the "not [[heresy]]" stamp from the [[Adeptus Mechanicus]], the [[Imperium of Man]] began supplying [[space marine chapter]]s with them, who dubbed them "centurion" after the former officers of the [[Legiones Astartes]]. The centurion is a specialist piece of equipment used for sieges or line-breaking. Despite not interfacing with the space marines' [[Gene-seed|black carapace]], which has no in-game benefit anyway, it gives the marine durability (+T and +S) that is rivaled by that of a [[dreadnought]], without the requirement of losing their spine and three out of four limbs in a heroic but probably avoidable last stand. Instead of recruiting out of the chapter's First Company [[Veteran Squad|veterans]], centurion wearers are recruited from the [[assault squad|assault]] or [[devastator squad]]s, as centurions are only useful in specific roles of assault and heavy weapons, and their wearers need to be immersed in a specific type of warfare. This doesn't make much sense as an explanation though, since tactical marines already went through being devastators and then assault marines. Unfortunately, only the sergeant can be upgraded to a vet, which makes assault centurion cry, as that extra attack would be nice. Also, for some reason, the pilots fold their arms over their chest once inside the suit, controlling it with their thoughts. Why they don't simply use their arms is beyond me. (Ever seen how far its shoulders are away from the head, and how far apart; especially when looking at a model from the front? A space marine would probably need at least two extra joints in their additionally lengthened arms to be able to actually stick them in there and control it directly.)

While you won't be blam'd for calling them [[Reasonable Marines|"reasonable dreadnoughts"]], it should be noted that their current status makes them inferior to true dreadnoughts DUE TO THE LACK OF HEROIC SACRIFICES.

They are also commonly referred to as "Space Marine inside a Space Marine (see above)" or "baby [[Dreadknight]]s" by fa/tg/uys. Sometimes "tubinators" by less fa/tg/uys or "Matryoshka Marines" by Russian wannabes. Actual Russians call them "[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kolobok Kolobki]".

Those who hate how it looks compared to the [[derp|awesome to fail art]] can [[Counts As| kitbash]] [[Cataphractii Pattern Terminator Armour|cataphractii]] and some weapon bits. Those who are lazy and have some money can use [[Graviton weapons]] Forge World bits to represent [[Grav-Cannon|Grav-Cannons]] (With attached [[Grav-Amp]]), [[Maxim Bolter]]s or [[Rotor Cannon]]s for [[Hurricane Bolter]]s and [[Cyclone Missile Launcher|Cyclones for Missile Launchers.]] Just buy a squad of Cataphractii, the special weapon sets, and the Iron Hands Forge Lord to represent the Sergeant and paint them the colors of your chosen chapter.

If you don't mind how they look you may as well kitbash from other models anyways. Seriously, as [[Games Workshop|selling a kidney]] or [[Fabius Bile|becoming a drug dealer]] is required to afford two centurion squads and the [[land raider]] or flier you want to put them in. Ass-cen kitbashing will require some extra cash and searching to represent the drills with meltaguns or flamers. However, you might happen to be a [[Imperial Fists|masochist]], as they are not as good as their shooty battle-brothers.

==Tabletop==
So how are they on the table? Well, it's complicated. You see the squads have a lot of power but come with drawbacks that you're not used to seeing in marine armies. Both squads are very durable with T5 W2 and 2+ saves, have a wide selection of mostly twin-linked weapons, and can move, and fire both in the same turn and still assault thanks to Slow and Purposeful.

Dev-Cens wreck armor with access to [[lascannons]], and [[Missile Launcher#Missile Launcher|missile launchers]], or pump out tons of bolt shots, or both if you mix and match, which is generally a terrible idea. They also can be equipped with [[Grav-Cannon|grav-cannons,]] '''which are the ultimate MEQ and TEQ killers.''' Ass-Cens, meanwhile, can wreck anything in assault, [[Anal Circumference|particularly asses]], with 2 S10 AP2 Armorbane (specialist weapons, not that that matters) [[Miscellaneous Weapons#Assault/Siege Drill|Siege Drill]] attacks, at initiative, along with twin-linked [[Flamer#Flamer|flamers,]] or [[Meltagun|meltas,]] with either [[Hurricane Bolter|hurricane bolters,]] or [[Ironclad Assault Launcher|ironclad assault launchers.]]

On the other hand, both squads are very expensive, clocking in at just under terminator cost before wargear. It costs a fortune to take a 5 man unit of either, the Dev-Cen especially, having to pay an extra 20 pts per if they're replacing their base heavy bolter. Now for the drawbacks. Slow and Purposeful keeps the squad from running, sweeping advancing, or overwatching, which with the exception of the restriction on sweeping advance are very foreign concepts to marine units.

In summary Centurions are marines cranked up to 11, but marines that don't fill any roles their army didn't already have covered by another, cheaper, unit. They have their uses but can be very situational. Dev-Cents are the ultimate TEQ deleters, if you get them close enough, and can also carve chunks out of strong-armored Monstrous Creatures. Ass-Cens, sadly, are useless. (Kidding aside, these guys were released coinciding with Stronghold Assault; they break buildings and do a pretty fine job of it. At-initiative S9 AP 2 and a 2+ also means the serge can hunt for all kinds of challenges. They're a specialized unit, but not a totally useless one.)

A certain build called the Grav-Star has four to six of them with [[Grav-Cannon]]s and [[Hurricane Bolter]]s paired with Tigurius rolling for Gates of Infinity and then whatever goodies he can get on other tables, then paired with whatever other HQs you feel like having (such as a beatstick build chaptermaster and/or some psykers for more buffs) that can then be further paired with a Tau buffmander. This can become very expensive (nearing 1000 points for a six cent build with all the bells and whistles!), but has the durability and firepower to devastate just about anything it meets while weathering the storm itself.

===Mathhammer Minute===
For the table below, assume bolters are at single-shot range. Graviton weapons are counted as dealing two glances on a 6 but no glances on a 5-down. This list doesn't count Imperial Fist Centurion devastators, who would get tank hunters which would be a pretty substantial boon for lascannon and missile launcher loadouts and basically make them Ersatz Railgun Broadsides (well before the 6th edition nerf) in terms of lethality to tanks.

{| class="wikitable sortable"
|+ Average Number of Glances and Penetrations Dealt
! rowspan = "2" | Name !! rowspan = "2" | Points !! colspan = "5" | AV
|-
! 10 !! 11 !! 12 !! 13 !! 14
|-
! 2 Centurions with TL Lascannon and Missile Launcher
|style="text-align:center;" | 160 || 2.89 || 2.37 || 1.85 || 1.33 || 0.81
|-
! 2 Centurions with Grav-Cannon/Amp and Hurricane Bolters
|style="text-align:center;" | 160 || 4.96 || 4.07 || 4.07 || 4.07 || 4.07
|-
! 4 Lascannon Devastators + Sergeant (Signum)
|style="text-align:center;" | 150 || 2.83 || 2.36 || 1.89 || 1.42 || 0.94
|-
! 4 Missile Devastators + Sergeant (Signum)
|style="text-align:center;" | 130 || 2.36 || 1.89 || 1.42 || 0.94 || 0.47
|-
! 4 Heavy Bolter Devastators + Sergeant (Signum)
|style="text-align:center;" | 110 || 2.83 || 1.42 || 0.00 || 0.00 || 0.00
|}

As you can see, the incredible rate of fire of grav-cannons (particularly wielded by a Relentless model), combined with, for their BS of 4, the superiority of Shred (multiplies wounding by 1.83) to Twin-Linked (multiplies accuracy by 1.33), combined with their ability to deal 2 hull points when they do get through, means they are consistently the best choice against any target. They are usually paired with hurricane bolters, as neither hurricane bolters nor missile launchers will help significantly against most hard targets but the hurricane bolters help much more against light infantry swarms.

For comparison, how they do against infantry (same range):

{| class="wikitable sortable" border=1
|+ Average Number of Wounds Dealt
! rowspan = "2" | Name !! rowspan = "2" | Points !! rowspan = "2" | Armor Save !! colspan = "10" | Toughness
|-
! 1 !! 2 !! 3 !! 4 !! 5 !! 6 !! 7 !! 8 !! 9 !! 10
|-
! rowspan = 6 | 2 Centurions with Grav-Cannon/Amp and Hurricane Bolters
| rowspan = 6 style="text-align:center;" | 160
|style="text-align:center;" | - || 6.48 || 6.48 || 5.59 || 4.70 || 3.81 || 2.93 || 2.93 || 2.04 || 2.04 || 2.04
|-
|style="text-align:center;" | 6 || 6.48 || 6.48 || 5.59 || 4.70 || 3.81 || 2.93 || 2.93 || 2.04 || 2.04 || 2.04
|-
|style="text-align:center;" | 5 || 8.15 || 8.15 || 7.26 || 6.37 || 5.48 || 4.59 || 4.59 || 3.70 || 3.70 || 3.70
|-
|style="text-align:center;" | 4 || 7.22 || 7.22 || 6.78 || 6.33 || 5.89 || 5.44 || 5.44 || 5.00 || 5.00 || 5.00
|-
|style="text-align:center;" | 3 || 7.41 || 7.41 || 7.11 || 6.81 || 6.52 || 6.22 || 6.22 || 5.93 || 5.93 || 5.93
|-
|style="text-align:center;" | 2 || 7.22 || 7.22 || 7.07 || 6.93 || 6.78 || 6.63 || 6.63 || 6.48 || 6.48 || 6.48
|}

[[File:Centurion Mathammer Wound.PNG|left]]
{{Clear}}

===8th Edition===
[[File:Centurian.jpg|300px|thumb|right|A Devastator Centurion, right after having the blood of alien infantry hosed off of it.]]
Centurions both have the same base statline: T5, W4, and Sv2+ means that they can take a beating before going down. However, they are hamstrung by their 4" movement, forcing them to waddle across the battlefield in an adorable but helpless way. Giving them a transport is useful, but they have to take either a [[Stormraven]] or a [[Land Raider]] because their big adorable butts can't fit in other vehicles. The Devastators won't really need a transport once they're in place, but the Assault Squad will really need one if it wants to do more than punch one tank into scrap and walk around for the rest of the game. Both units can also count as Combat Squads if they're 6 models large (good luck affording that) and thanks to their sergeant's Omniscope they ignore the bonuses enemies get from cover, which is especially nice for the Devastators. Centurions are also your premier multi-wound infantry unit this edition and benefit well from [[Apothecary]] support. (Even though with that armour a Techmarine would make as much sense.)

Clocking in at 89 points each, Centurion Devastator Squads are costly but effective. But the problems start the moment you remember the prices are added separately. That's right, they cost like damn Razorbacks each! However, with two [[Heavy Bolter]]s and a Hurricane Bolter they can deliver 6 shots at 36", 12 at 24" and a whopping 18 at 12" ''each''. That means 18, 36 and 54 at those ranges for a 3-man squad. Dropping them in a nice and snug place where they can make entire units of infantry disappear in a single phase. Even if you have to move, because of their Decimator Protocols rule they don't get hit with the -1 penalty when firing heavy weapons on the move. And don't forget that you don't ''have'' to shoot all your guns in one go: you can roll them one after the other to make sure you don't waste your rolls or those of your primary guns. And even if you've armed them with something else than Heavy Bolters, you can still use the Hurricane Bolter to really discourage incoming infantry. They have three weapon options if the mother of all [[Bolter]] fire doesn't do it for you:

* '''Centurion [[Missile Launcher]]s''' can replace the Hurricane Bolter. The 25 points price tag is hefty, but having Assault D3 S8 AP-2 D3 missiles coming from each of the Centurions will dent all but the toughest tanks. They have a shorter range than their other anti-tank gun, so keep that in mind when positioning.
* '''[[Lascannon]]s''' can replace your Heavy Bolters. Note that you have to replace ''both'' of them, so no mix and match goodness on the same model (but you can within the same unit and still aim for different targets). While a 30 point bump per Centurion, having six Lascannons in one unit will really ruin a tank's or monster's day. Problem? It costs like a lazorback. While being three times more squishy, unless the enemy is using S2 AP- weapons.
* '''[[Grav-Cannon]]s with [[Grav-Amp]]s''' are a bit of an odd duck. Only a bit more expensive than the Heavy Bolters, you only get ''one'' of these per Centurion. Which is a good thing, because otherwise they'd be ungodly expensive. And even then, a dozen shots at S5 AP-3 1 damage that goes to D3 against anything with a 3+ save or higher, this can really ruin the day of heavy infantry. And with the limited range on this gun, they work together pretty well with the Hurricane Bolter (as long as you aim that at a different unit).

Centurion Assault Squads are 91 points and come with Siege Drills, two flamers and Centurion Assault Launchers. The drills deal a whopping S10 AP-4 3 damage hit each, so whatever they hit will feel it. The Centurion Assault Launchers let them do a Mortal Wound on whatever they charge on a 4+: useful, but not a game changer. They also come with two Flamers each, meaning 6 of them on the whole unit. And yes, that means you get to sling 6d6 Flamer hits if the enemy gets too close. You have two options to replace either of your weapons that's not the drills:

* '''[[Meltagun]]s''' can replace the Flamers. While this costs 18 points per model, you can now have 6 melta shots on a 3-man unit. Some simple mathhammer tells you that this is an average of 7 damage... when you're not within 6". Expensive, but it can turn tanks to slag like it's nobody's business.
* '''[[Hurricane Bolter]]s''' can replace the Centurion Assault Launchers at 4 points a pop. Oh yes, the Assault Squads can have these too. They work especially well with Flamers, because if you can hit a target with your Flamers you can hit them with your Hurricane Bolters. Sure, a S4 AP0 hit doesn't do diddly, but '''45 of them''' (3x6 shots, double at half range, 2/3rds hit plus the average of 6d6) will ruin the day of ANY infantry that comes too close.

Devastator Squads are an expensive but useful tool to deliver a truly massive amount of firepower. While taking the anti-tank approach sounds fun, this will mean that your Centurions will cost 140 points ''each'', which will put a major dent in your budget. If you want a large number of [[Lascannon]]s, take a [[Predator]] instead. Two of them fully kitted with Lascannons are not only cheaper they are also tougher, have more Wounds and can move three times as fast. The Heavy Bolter approach is cheaper: two full Devastator Squads with three Heavy Bolters each have roughly the same firepower, but are some 40 points more expensive and a lot more fragile, if more easily transported.

Assault Squads are more of a mixed bag. 285 points for a full squad with Hurricane Bolters is quite the investment, but nothing can lay down a smackdown like such a unit can. Two units of Tactical Marines could try and match the same degree of firepower, but they're 33 or so points more expensive and are still two Flamers short, as well as lacking the sheer durability. The Meltagun approach can reliably pop tanks, but once popped they're kinda out of options. Because they can waddle at only 4" per turn they're easy pickings for anyone wishing them harm, and even when you bring a Stormraven (expensive) or a Land Raider (even more expensive) they're still sitting ducks for one turn. Attacking enemy units is an option if parked besides their transport, but with 7 attacks at WS 3+ means that you're going to have trouble with units that are more than 5 models large.

===Power Rating===
Centurions hit a bit of a snag with Power Ratings. Sure, you can pick all those expensive guns and upgrades for free... except that a 3-man Assault Squad clocks in at 15 Power. You can get ''three'' 5-man Tactical squads with only three Bolter shots short for that cost. Sure, they're more fragile but they're faster and can take just about any transport for a ride. And the Devastator squads cost ''17 per 3 Centurions''. For one point more you'll get 8 Lascannon shots on two sturdy Predator tanks. Sure, you'll trade your missiles in for those shots and durability, but two tanks can do more than one small squad. The Heavy Bolter route is better. A six-man squad of Centurion Devastators can have 12 Heavy Bolters and 36/72 Bolter shots for 34 points. thats a total of 108 shots at range of 12 take that for what you will. overwatch anyone?

So are they still useful? Yes, if you're willing and able to make the investment and can deal with all your firepower in one point. If not, it might be best to look at other options.

==Gallery==
<gallery>
Image:CenturionSquad.jpg|Devastator Centurions
Image:CenturionMelee.jpg|Assault Centurions
Image:Marine_Knights.png|Daaaaaaawwwww.....
Image:Armour of Bulk.png|The Emperor's finest.
</gallery>

[[Category:Warhammer 40,000]]
[[Category:Imperial]]
[[Category:Space Marines]]
[[Category:Official Space Marine Chapters]]

{{Marines-Forces}}
{{Imperial Fists}}
{{Iron Hands}}

Celestians

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[[File:SoBCelestian.jpg|thumb|right|CEASE AND FUCKING DESIST, HERETIC.]]

{{topquote|Many aspire. Few attain.|Celestian in ''[[Dawn of War]]: [[Dawn of War#Soulstorm|Soulstorm]]''}}

'''Celestians''' are the best of the best within an order of the [[Sisters of Battle|Adeptus Sororitas]]. To earn the rank of Celestian a sister must have proved herself on dozens of battlefields and must be skilled with every weapon in the [[Ecclesiarchy|Ecclesiarchy's]] armory. These ladies are some of the hardest SOB's (DOB's? or are they just B's? {{BLAM}} {{BLAM|HERESY! THEY ARE DAUGHTERS OF THE EMPEROR!}}) you'll meet save for the <s>space marines</s> Imperial Guard. Off the battlefield they have many of the duties of a sister superior in addition to serving as go-betweens for the Canoness and the other sisters of her order. They also serve as bodyguards [[PROMOTIONS|and advisers]] to important members of the Ecclesiarchy.

==Types of Celestians==
There are a few variations of the normal Celestian Squads. These include....

===Celestian Sacresant===
[[File:Celestian_Sacresant.jpg|200px|right|thumb|From Bolter Bitches to Shield Bitches.]]
Traditionally the bodyguards of their Order's leaders, Sacresants are equipped with Sacresant Shields, [[Bolt Pistol]]s, [[Power weapon#Hallowed Mace|Hallowed Maces]] and [[Power weapon#Anointed Halberd|Anointed Halberds]] to [[Rip and Tear]] in melee and are charged with securing sacred sites on the battlefield.

They are also tasked with the holy duty of purging the impure and driving them from sites of sacred significance on the battlefield.

Protected in both body and spirit, Celestian Sacresants are the wall against which waves of Heretics will break and they are able to overcome many times their own number in battle through sheer perserverance.

===Celestian Superior===
The senior Celestians in an Order, Celestians Superior aid the [[Canoness]] with the day-to-day running of the Order. They specifically act as administrative liaisons between the Sisters Superior and the Canoness, and may even lead Battle Sisters into combat when the Canoness is otherwise engaged.

===Imagifer===
A single Celestian in a Celestian Squad may be nominated as a Imagifer or Imagifier AKA Banner Bearers. These often carry a Simulacrum Imperialis, one of the Orders' ancient banners, into combat unarmed, to inspire their fellow sisters to fight harder against all odds. They are only found in Celestian, Battle Sister, Dominion and Retributor squads as they are always Sisters units. Within Seraphim squads the Veteran Sister Superior carries the Simulacrum Imperialis, effectively becoming an Imagifer.

===Celestian Bodyguard===
Occasionally, Celestians may be formed up into bodyguard groups for senior members of the Order, such as Celestians Superior or even a Canoness. To be selected for such a role the Celestian must have previously distinguished herself in battle. The most noble warriors of the Order, Celestians approved for bodyguard duties may also be given additional responsibilities, such as becoming a banner-bearer, an Imagifier or a being assigned a particular duty in the Convent-Shrine.

===Ophelian Celestian Squad===
Ophelian Celestian Squads are formed from the best Celestians of the Orders Militants, hailing from the convents on Ophelia VII. If the need arises the entire squad can be requisitioned into serving in a Canoness' personal retinue.

==Tabletop==
With the new 8th edition codex, Celestians make a lot more sense. Better melee stats, higher Ld, and the ability to intercept wounds for characters make them a solid bodyguard choice, as in the fluff.

[[Category:Warhammer 40,000]]
[[Category:Imperial]]
[[Category:Sisters of Battle]]

{{Template:Sisters-of-Battle}}

Celestial Lions

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{{Infobox Spess Mahreen Chapter
|Name = Celestial Lions
|Heraldry = [[File:Celestial_Lions_Livery.png|150px]]
|Battle Cry = "We are the Emperor's pride. [[A Song of Ice and Fire|Hear us roar!]]"
|Number =
|Founding = Sometime in the 38th Millennium
|Successors of = [[Imperial Fists]]
|Successor Chapters =
|Chapter Master = Unknown (Previously Ekene Dubaku [[Officio Assassinorum|who got shanked]] by [[Inquisition|pure salt]])
|Primarch = Rogal Dorn
|Homeworld = Elysium IX (destroyed, no thanks to the [[Rage|FUCKING INQUISITION]]
|Specialty = Messing with the [[Inquisition]], flanking tactics, being an actual Space African chapter unlike the [[Salamanders (Chapter)#Peculiarities|Salamanders]]
|Strength = After Armageddon, [[Grimdark|less than 95]]. Now [[Noblebright|rebuilding]], numbers unknown.
|Allegiance = [[Imperium]]
|Colours = [[Stormcast Eternals|Gold, with blue helmet and pauldrons]].
}}
{{topquote|Whoever corrects a mocker invites insults, whoever rebukes the [[Inquisition|wicked]] incurs [[Blam|abuse]].|The Bible, Proverbs 9:7 (New International Version)}}

{{topquote|The wicked flee when no one pursues, but the righteous are bold as a lion.|The Bible, Proverbs 28:1}}

The '''Celestial Lions''' (calling them "Celestial ''Loins''" would be a joke in poor taste, given their tremendous losses of late) are a chapter of [[Space Marines]] in the [[Warhammer 40,000]] universe. They are an object lesson of what happens to people who try and mess with the [[Inquisition]] without serious backup (like being a [[First Founding]] chapter and/or [[Space Wolves|staying at legion strength]]). It is unknown if the Inquisition is going to survive the return object lesson of what happens to those who fuck with the Space Marines. Especially Space Marines who are now best-buds with the Black Templars. With Guilliman's return, who has an express zero tolerance for stupid waste, especially with that [[Great Rift|big new jelly stain covering the galactic map]], that return object lesson is now pretty much assured. They are part of the Adeptus Vaelarii guarding over the Elara's Veil region of space.

==Chapter Culture==
The Celestial Lions are a very brotherly, compassionate chapter, whose fraternal nature comes from the fact that they only recruit from the warrior tribes of the world Elysium IX. As they all come from a culture that values community, legacy, and courage, all the Lions hold those values as paramount. More than most other chapters, their world's culture holds sway in their conduct. The Lions are very informal to those within their own ranks, with even basic battle brothers talking to their superiors as brothers and equals, though they are disciplined on the battlefield and they show great respect to the officers of other forces, particularly the other [[Black Templars|sons]] [[Imperial fists|of]] [[Crimson Fists|Dorn]]. Another quirk of their chapter culture is the [[Space Wolves|value they place on storytelling and the great respect they give to talented storytellers]]. Within their chapter it is common for a squad to gather and tell stories of their heroes and their own exploits before an engagement. If an outsider is present in one of their ships or bases the visitor is expected to pay for their "food and fire" by telling a story from their own people's legends or that individuals exploits and as such they love serving alongside Guardsmen for the [[Ollanius Pius|stories]] [[Ciaphas Cain|they]] [[Commissar Yarrick|tell]]. Though they are very different from their [[imperial fists|typical]] [[Black Templars|grim]] cousin chapters, they are proud sons of [[Rogal Dorn|Dorn]] through and through. Most of this can be inferred from the short story in the Helsreach book.

==Clash with the Inquisition==
The Celestial Lions came into conflict with the [[Inquisition]] during the pacification of the world Khattar. Khattar was a [[Ecclesiarchy|Shrine World]] with a large, faithful population. When the upper echelons of the priesthood fell into worship of the [[Chaos|Ruinous Powers]], an Inquisitor Lord by the name of Apollyon (which is the Greek equivalent of "Destroyer", i.e. [[Abaddon]]) called for an Imperial Navy blockade of the world in addition to Astartes support, a call that the Celestial Lions answered. After months of brutal fighting, the Celestial Lions managed to cut the head off the local heretic priests, and with that, the world's population lost the will to fight and surrendered to the Astartes. As the Lions were withdrawing, Inquisitor Apollyon decided that [[wat|since the priesthood had been corrupt, the surrendering and repentant civilian population must also be corrupt]], so he ordered Exterminatus on the planet. The Lions [[RAGE|were not fucking amused]]. After Apollyon refused to be held accountable for the senseless massacre, saying it was necessary, the Lions sent a Strike Cruiser with a delegation of Deathspeakers and Warleaders (Chaplains and Captains, respectively) to [[Terra|Holy Terra]] with the intention of entreating the High Lords of Terra to call the Inquisition to task over what they'd done. The ship was discovered two years later in Ork-controlled space, with nobody left alive in it, nowhere even close to its intended destination. This is a little deeper than it looks, too, as Exterminatus is reserved for planets that are too far lost to be ever recovered by the Imperium. Seeing as that was clearly not the case here, their story is perhaps meant to demonstrate how dangerous a rogue Inquisitor is.

If anything, their stubbornness proves they are true sons of Rogal Dorn.

==Third War for Armageddon==
[[File:Celestial Lions Astartes.png|thumb|right|200px|They're as badass as they look]]
Fast-forward to the Third War for [[Armageddon]]. The entire chapter was deployed to a single hive, and thanks to spectacularly bad intelligence they ended up outnumbered, unsupported, and taking heavy losses at every battle, culminating in a mission in which the supposedly inactive Gargants they were sent to destroy proved to have been lying in wait for them along with several [[Ork]] warbands backing them up- all of which had apparently been warned of the Lions' planned attack some time beforehand. Matters came to a head when "[[Vindicare Assassin|Ork snipers]]" managed to take out most of the survivors (especially the Apothecaries), and their last [[Apothecary]] was found dead next to the Chapter's last [[Land Raider]] (having been shot through the head with a [[lasgun]] at point blank range and the gene-seed he was carrying stolen), leaving them without any means to recover the [[gene-seed]] from their fallen. The remaining 95 Lions realized that they had been marked for death and decided that they would fight off all the Orks on Armageddon or die trying, and contacted [[Grimaldus|Chaplain Grimaldus]] of the [[Black Templars]] to administer their last rites, but he insisted that the remainder of the Chapter could still restore its honour (and thus be allowed to leave) by slaying the warlord leading the Ork forces in the area. To support his weakened cousins Grimaldus used his influence as the 'Hero of Helsreach' to get support from several regiments of [[Imperial Guard]]. While much of the remaining forces of the Celestial Lions were wiped out in the attack, they were successful in redeeming themselves when Ekene Dubaku killed the Orkish Warlord with Grimaldus's help. What's more, it is mentioned Orks' structures in the valley were sabotaged during battle by an unknown force, presumably, Inquisition's own operatives, taking some pressure off the besieging forces. So it was all but stayed the Inquisition abandoned their campaign against the remaining Lions either because the lesson had been thoroughly learnt and the Black Templars were now aware of their traitorous activity or some other Inquisitor(s) became privy to the whole thing and chastised the ones who committed it. [[Aaron_Dembski-Bowden|ADB]] must have been drunk while writing this, because it makes too much sense in-universe for his style, so it was later retconned. Ekene, the Lions only surviving Pride Leader (i.e. Squad Sergeant) was then named the new Chapter Master and given a couple of parting gifts by High Marshal Helbrecht himself: a suit of relic Imperial Fists power armor dating back to the [[Great Crusade]] along with a matching Relic Blade and the Strike Cruiser ''Blade of the Seventh Son''.

==Ultimate Fate==
The Lions are now working to rebuild with the help of a temporary detachment of Black Templar specialists, including some apothecaries and techmarines. Though it'll be hard considering there's less than ninety-five of them left and their homeworld is nuked, another Imperial Fists successor chapter recovered from near-extinction in less than a century after being reduced to 12 Marines in total. Plus, while the Inquisition may get away with bullying later-founded chapters, it would be tantamount to suicide for anyone to mess with the [[Black Templars|largest space marine chapter]] excluding the [[Dark Angels]] <strike>legion</strike>.

Now let's talk about that retcon mentioned earlier. You would think with the Indomitus Crusade going on, it's more than likely Guilliman sent some Primaris Marines to rebuild the Lions, right? RIGHT?!? NOPE, as it turns out, this is not the case; the Inquisition's saltiness was so severe that [[derp|they ended up never actually getting the information to CREATE PRIMARIS MARINES]] and had to get the information from their brother chapter the [[Emperor's Spears]]. It's not explicitly explained as to how that happened, but presumably they just weren't included in any relief fleets' destinations (and since those usually have Custodes to ...[[BLAM|convince]] anyone not accepting of NuMarines, one must wonder how did this come to pass).

The salt continues to flow for the Inquisition when in the novel ''Spear of the Emperor'', it's stated that Ekene Dubaku was beheaded by a [[Callidus]] posing as thrall servant of Amadeus Kaias Incarius from the [[Mentors]]. So now the Inquisition, Officio Assassinorum, and the Mentors have dishonored and therefore majorly pissed off yet another Chapter ''and'' the Black Templars, and that's ignoring the fact that all sons of Dorn stick together, being the closest thing to a Legion of old, second only to the Dark Angels. Even if the Mentors were ignorant, then those other institutions have now pissed off three Chapters and all of their friends.

Out of universe this further proves that ADB is a hack for killing off cool characters to shill his OCs (debatable inasmuch Ekene Dubaku is also his OC) and can't live a day without showing how bad and oppressive Imperium is: while the Imperium's closeminded fanaticism contributes to its grimdarkness, the post-Armageddon cleansing of the Celestial Lions contradicts established lore. No one, especially not nameless Inquisitors, have the power to just ignore multiple Space Marine chapters, and none but the Emperor himself have the authority to prevent the Custodes from reinforcing an obviously loyal chapter. The Inquisition like to claim that they speak with the Emperor's authority, but the Custodes ''actually'' do, and what's more, they don't have to announce it, because nearly everyone knows that it is so, and those few boneheaded exceptions are inevitably [[BLAM|corrected]] before long.

ADB's hamfisted heavyhandedness runs counter to logic, and this obviously, this results in grimderp fluff. In universe on the other hand: "Ork snipers" could have been accepted for a time, grots are on the level of the human with the same ballistic skill after all, and it's not like there is concrete proof of Assassins being involved in this one: after all, each Inquisitor has a retinue, some being the size of small armies, so finding snipers shouldn't have been a problem. But now the Assassinorum has openly been involved in what most definitely qualifies as treason. Of course, on paper at least, '''EVERY''' use of an Officio Assassinorum operative requires authorization of the Imperial Senate (and there is a special minor Ordo with the sole purpose of ensuring this fact), but this is forgotten once again for the sake of the story; alternatively, this could be explained away as an Inquisitor exceeding his remit [far from uncommon, especially in ADB's work] and appropriating the use of an assassin already in the field.

There's also the further complication that recent fluff has made it explicitly clear that the Officio Assassinorum's reverence for the Emperor and HIS law is marrow-deep, and that staying focused on the art of killing in service to the Master of Mankind allows them to stay largely clear of the internecine politicking that often plagues the other branches of government; however, the Officio does not take kindly to attempts by third-parties to infiltrate their organization, and even less kindly to being co-opted by anyone not granted the authority to do so. Guilliman, a primarch, and son of the Emperor, appointed Imperial Regent by his father, which was confirmed by a High Lord of Terra, Captain-General Trajan Valoris, has that authority. Some nobody Inquisitor, or even Inquisitor Lord does not. So it may very well be that the Inquisition has also added itself to the Assassinorum's shit-list as a result of this petty dumbfuckery as well.

Receiving Inquisitorial permission or orders to kill a Chapter for enforcing the Emperor's law is... complicated to say the least. Getting the resources to actually manage it also presents a problem. Another point is that the Inquisition itself is not a single entity, with a complex net of counterbalances ensuring one person (or even a whole cabal of them) don't wield too much power without answering to anyone, effectively policing itself. For example, [[Kryptman]] and Inquisitors who supported him in destroying numerous worlds were excommunicated despite his Exterminatus campaign turning out to be justified. And we as readers are meant to believe the Inquisitors responsible for the initial incident with the Celestials Lions are not only not punished for their deeds, but gathered enough support to continue their bullshit unopposed ''for one hundred years''.

However, with the murder of the Chapter Master, the chapters allied to the Lion's have had enough. Which chapters? The Emperor's Spears, and the motherfucking Black Templars to start. With both saying that if an inquisitor shows their face near a Lion, the Templars will go to war for the Lions, and the Inquisition can probably rule out the acquiescence from any other sons of Dorn. Furthermore, the Celestial Lions would have no trouble finding additional allies; the Space Wolves are the obvious first example, but the Dark Angels and Ultramarines, as well as many of their descendant chapters, not to mention both of their recently returned respective primarchs, would probably be amenable to the plight of the Celestial Lions.

Regardless, '''WHEN''' this gets back to Guilliman, and make no mistake, it '''WILL''', some heretics are gonna die and the Inquisition itself could take a major hit. Frankly put, the Inquisition has simply made too many enemies of late, while simultaneously not producing sufficient levels of success; abusing their authority, and ultimately damaging the Imperium as a whole. While [[Malcador_the_Sigillite|a mere human]] opposing [[Rogal Dorn|a son of the Emperor]] is not without precedent, knowing the circumstances, those responsible are likely to be be executed by their own colleagues to, at the very least, minimize the damage to their public image; all the more so since more and more in recent fluff, we're seeing the Inquisition is painfully aware that it's on notice. That is, as long as the author who gets to write it has at least a single functioning brain cell.

==Trivia==
* "[[Ork Snipers]]" has since become slang for [[Vindicare]] assassins, or more generally for any implausible cover story for an [[Inquisition]] action.
**Although given the fact the new kill team box set features [[Ork Kommando#Snipa_Boy|Ork Snipers]] they might have to change the meme to something else.
* You know who else have golden armour, blue details and star patterns? [[Stormcast Eternals|Hammers of Sigmar]]. Funny, huh?
*Blue glitter paint, or clear glitter over blue, is much easier than painting individual stars.
* Also, "Ekene Dubaku" (Emperor rest his soul) is a badass as fuck name.
*They love catnip.
*[[Space Wolves|They do not use]] [[Thunderwolf Cavalry|actual lions]]. Celestial or otherwise.

==Daily Routines==
05:00 - The Don't Wake-Up on time: The Celestial Lions awaken... later than they'd like, thanks to the Inquisition dicking around with their alarm clocks forcing some to oversleep or not get any sleep, not go off, or just spontaneously combust, or at random times hear a loud "BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP!" After waking they immediately recite a Litany of Hatred upon the Inquisition. During the night the Inquisition will have planted hundreds of Astartes-sized mouse traps around the beds of many groggy brothers, who walk into them.

05:15 - Morning Grooming - The Celestial Lions will attempt to ritually cleanse themselves only to find the Inquisition has replaced their Astartes-sized talcum powder with itching powder and put Bouillon cubes in their shower heads, such Inquisitorial chicanery will not go un-avenged.

05:30 - Morning Prayer: The Celestial Lions pray to tell amazing stories, as well as troll the Inquisition. Any brother caught praying for mercy from the Inquisition is sent to the Deathwatch.

06:00 - Morning Firing Rites: The Celestial Lions tell stories to each other, and laugh heartily amongst themselves. Their targets are painted to look like Inquisitors, though some of the targets look '''VERY''' life-like.

07:00 - Morning Battle Practice: The Celestial Lions reenact battles they have been in to entertain the neophytes and children of the Imperium. Sometimes, a human dressed as an Inquisitor will be the victim of a plethora of slapstick jokes.

08:00 - Morning Feast: A great feast is prepared by the Chapter Serfs. The Serfs are invited to join the Battle Brothers at the table as they tell stories and tales of heroic deeds. Any serf who has the best story about being a troll is immediately inducted into the scout company. Any Battle Brother doing the same gets to hold the Chapter Standard for the rest of the day.

09:00 - Tactical Indoctrination: The Celestial Lions gather to make fun of the Inquisition. All the Ordos, as well as the Deathwatch and Grey Knights are talked copious amounts of shit. However, any Battle Brother who sullies the name of the Sororitas is immediately appointed as the chapter's Inquisitorial Liaison for his heresy.

10:00 - Daily Check-up: The Celestial Lions report to the Apothecarion for their checkups, known as Lifebinders. unfortunately thanks to a bad case of "shot in the face" by "Ork snipers" and that one time a titan legion "accidentally" stepped on the entire Medicae team on Armageddon they only have one apothecary, this results in much waiting in line for the Space Marine Apothecaries and reading of Astartes sized magazines while they wait.

11:00 - Midday Battle Practice: The Celestial Lions will disperse to whatever field the captains deem necessary, to cull captured Orks or traitors at this point in the day the Inquisition will usually try to pick off few more Celestial Lions, with schemes ranging from Vindicare snipers to Eversors strapped to oversized fireworks and Mechanicus issued rocket skates.

12:00 - Afternoon Feast: The Chapter gathers to laugh and tell more stories of great deeds. Serfs are encouraged to participate, encouraging them to criticize and throw the best insult at the inquisition whenever possible.

13:00 - Mail and Postage: For the next hour the Chapter Master see to matters such as answering letters from a grateful Imperium, requests for aid and sending away box tops to Mars for a new Repulsor tank etc., at this point the Inqusition will try to send some dynamite disguised as cigars to the chapters High Command, only for their scheme to literally blow up in their faces as they put their fortresses as the return address.

14:00 - Afternoon Firing Rites: Inquisitorial agents, soldiers, and assassins sent after them are placed in a field for target practice. Many times, the Chapter Serfs are allowed to take a few shots as well.

15:00 - Chaplain Motivational Speech: For the next hour the Chaplains known as Deathspeakers will extol the virtues of courage and honor while the Inquisition looks to eliminate these paragons of virtue, by dropping an inquisitorially sanctioned anvil on their heads from a Mechanicus issued weather balloon.

16:00 - Afternoon Battle Practice: The Celestial Lions meet with their Black Templar pals to practice melee and mechanized combat.

17:00 - Mechanized Field Maneuvers: The Celestial Lions will conduct armored field maneuvers involving rhinos, predators, and land raiders which unfortunately thanks to Inquisitorial meddling suffer many malfunctions such as brake-lines being cut, transports exploding, and the occasional potato shoved in the tailpipe.

18:00 - Evening Feast: The Celestial Lions, Black Templars, and Chapter Serfs all enjoy a nice meal. Everyone shares stories and tell of their feats, from killing Tau commanders and Ork Warbosses, to trolling [[Chris-chan|Zis-chan]].

19:00 - End of Day Announcements and Promotions: At the end of day the chapter High Command will bring up any declarations for the chapter or announce any promotions in the chapter, usually caused by a vacancy (of the Exitus Rifle kind), and will usually be filled by the one guy who the Inquisition failed to kill that day.

20:00 - Free time: The Celestial Lions tell each other more stories as their Templar friends depart. Whenever they find the Inquisitorial spy hiding in the air ducts, they drag him out and force him to watch video clips of Tau beating humans in melee. The sheer rage and disgust that appears on his face entertains the entire chapter. New Battle Brothers that were recruited after the nuking of Elysium IX will try various antics to try to fit in with their darker skinned brethren, such as using polymorphine [[Blood Ravens|"loaned"]] from captured [[Callidus Assassin|Callidus Assassins]] to alter their skin tone. Well intentioned brothers will be given a crash course in the lost tribal cultures of Elysium IX, pranksters who bandied about breaded and deep-fried poultry will be force-fed Bean and Okra Stew so that they may appreciate real cuisine.

21:00 - Chaplain Edict: the celestial lions will listen to their chaplain speak about courage and honor, only to find the Inquisition has replaced their sacred incense with window lean, swapped out parts of the sermon for chicken soup recipes and [[Dance Steps For GWs Space Hulk Game| dance routines]] topped off with dosing the Chaplain with a near lethal amount of helium. The end result is a squeeky skeleton man shouting about the Emperor and how he and Rogal Dorn busted a move on the Agri-world of Minced Garlic.

22:00 - Early Bedtime: Sleepy, the tired Celestial Lions will pounce into bed, only to find the Inquisition has replaced all their beds with all kinds of goofy shit, again. The resulting amounts of extreme lethargy and suicidal thoughts cause the spawning and immediate keeling over of a Great Unclean One in the realm of Nurgle.

24:00 - Real Bedtime: The Celestial Lions, after removing every last Squig from their rooms turn in for the night. Before they do so, the Chapter Master tells them all a bedtime story.

==Gallery==
<Gallery>
File:Black Library Armageddon by ukitakumuki.jpg|Black Templars [[Grimaldus]] and Pride Leader Ekene Dubaku kickin' Ork asses. Note how Grimaldus is far too much of a badass to look where he’s shooting.
File:Black Library Blood and Fire by ukitakumuki.jpg|Ekene Dubaku rocking the Bolt Carbine... Totally awesome. In other news, Grimaldus still isn’t looking where he’s shooting.
File:Ork Snipers.jpg|So True.
File:Celestial Lions.jpeg|We present to you, the Celestial Lions!
File:Celestial lions apothecary by rhoadesd20-d5941zd.jpg|A Celestial Lion Apothecary falling victim to an "Ork Sniper".
File:Celestial Lion from Space Marine Adventures.jpg|GW hasn't forgotten about Celestial Lions! A Lion in the Space Marine Adventures expansion set.
</Gallery>

{{Marines-Official}}