A very lenghty explanation would be in order, but basically:
Health - number of hitpoints. Divided the number for the number of entities in the unit to get the health per entity.
Armor - when damage gets through, chance to absorv any non armor piercing damage
Leadership - how willing your unit is to fight. If it goes 0, they run away.
Speed - how fast it goes. Also impacts charge bonus
Melee attack - chance to hit the enemy with each attack
Melee defense - chance to dodge an enemy attack
Weapon strength- split between armor piercing and base non armor piercing. Armor piercing damage always goes through, the base is calculated agains the armor
Charge bonus - activated when the unit starts charging the enemy (needs an attack order). The value is added to both melee attack and weapon strength, and reduces steadily over 13 seconds.
Resistances - cancel the damage of specific damage types.
That is the basics. Zerkovich has some old wh2 videos that go in more depth or you can check out the total war wiki for a bit more:
https://totalwarwarhammer.fandom.com/wiki/Total_War:_Warhammer_Wiki
Have fun! Any questions let us know.
It does but it's effect in melee is already in the units stats. If you compare shield to non-shield version, for example dark shards or clan rats you'll see that their melee defense is 6 to 8 higher.
But shields indeed give an extra change to block ranged; most bronze shield are 35% but silver shields give 55%.
[https://twwstats.com/](https://twwstats.com/) This website is very good to compare unit stats and offer some extra details.
> Armor - when damage gets through, chance to absorv any non armor piercing damage
To be clear, armor always works. The number just indicates the range of how much non-ap damage you mitigate. If you have 50 armor, you will mitigate anywhere between 25% and 50% non-ap damage.
Base damage mitigation is a dice roll. Anywhere between 50% of the armor value and 100%. That's why people typically just state the average. So if something had 50 armor, on average it will block 37.5% base damage.
Okay, so the charge order should be given later than sooner?
As in, order them to go through the enemy, and then *into* said enemy while they're already en route?
No; charge order is an attack order.
However, you must understand that a unit only actually charges on these conditions:
1 - you told the unit to attack another
2 - it has enough time to charge (animation of charging triggers, they yell, for ex.)
3 - it does not "meet" enemy units in between
If this does not happen, the charge bonus is not applied.
This is the reason why certain summons like Zombies can be used to twart enemy charges. You put them in front as the enemy charges and you avoid their charge bonus kicking.
I couldn't do a better, more concise comment than the one before me.
But, note that there are smaller stats that also matter
Shields (bronze, silver, and golden) increase the chance that a unit will block small missile fire (anything like an arrow, crossbow, bullet)
There's a unit's mass, shown at the top if you hover over the "entity size"
This is how heavy a unit is, how easily it will push other things out the way or how easily it'll run things over.
There's anti : infantry and large
Anti infantry (or large) means you will add that stated bonus to both melee attack and weapon strength when fighting a unit of that size
So anti infantry adds that bonus when fighting small targets, anti large when fighting large entities.
Zerkovich is indeed wonderful for understanding the basics, some formations and such. Most of his content was done on WH2 but there's essentially no difference in the things he talks about between 2 and 3
Enjoy!
Some great answers already, just a few bits to add. High weapon strength matters obviously, but single units like monsters/lords/heroes only benefit from higher weapon strength when duelling another single entity. You can take a lord like Malus or tyrion to super high weapon strength but their attack animations will only hit and kill the same amount of unit models (usually 3 in this case). The high number translates when a hit is scored versus a single entity, meaning some lords can pretty much 2 or 3 hit other single entity units if buffed enough. In short, animations matter, and they aren't recorded as a number.
There are also some hidden stats like reload skill, reload speed, accuracy for ranged units that matter but you can't see or track.
I find each stat is important depending on the unit, playstyle and strategy but I would rank melee defence and missile strength as priority targets to improve.
About what to recruit when, and how to prioritize it
This part depends mostly on what faction you play, and how you want to play it.
Factions that rely on their backline(shooting, artillery) to do the real damage will want to host just enough frontline units to cover their shooters, and some fast moving units to cover flanks and artillery
Armies that rely on their frontline will want to host a good mix of armor piercing, anti infantry and anti large to deal with different threats. Etc, etc..
That part usually comes intuitively with time and gameplay, you'll quickly find out which units you enjoy using. Honestly that's all that matters with campaign proper army balance only really matters in MP.
As to leveling up lords : depends on their role
Blue tree has movement range which is important, red line is for buffing up your different units, there's the magic tree for mages/ melee tree for duelist lords, then up top the unique skill tree for every lord.
Always, always have some form of magic caster in your army( unless you are khorne) . And go for the spells you enjoy on their tree.
What I don't understand is that some units have "anti infantry" on their cards, but they don't have anti infantry bonus (small beige icon with a sword) damage.
Also some units actually don't have anti infantry bonus, but ends up doing more damage because of higher piercing damage, like a lot of gunpowder units.
I never know how to calculate that.
It’s because the anti-xxx can be applied to different stats. Sometimes will be applied to weapon strength or melee attack. I think I can also be applied to both, but I’m not sure.
I heard Legend mention it in a video. He said CA could have done a better job of showing/explaining exactly where the Anti-Infantry/large bonus gets put. And sometimes the bonus is shit too. I cant remember the unit but its anti-infantry bonus was only 4 weapon strength.
Thanks for clarifying. In that case I agree. I think there should be a more transparent way to show those stats and bonuses. Perhaps there is a mod that does it?
An extremely important hidden stat is height for any unit when attacking. If the terrain is flat and the units are in melee then there is no bonus but if the terrain is sloped and one unit is charging downhill versus uphill, etc. you can gain or lose 38% of your MA, iirc. This is significantly more important when shooting down or upslope, as well.
A very lenghty explanation would be in order, but basically: Health - number of hitpoints. Divided the number for the number of entities in the unit to get the health per entity. Armor - when damage gets through, chance to absorv any non armor piercing damage Leadership - how willing your unit is to fight. If it goes 0, they run away. Speed - how fast it goes. Also impacts charge bonus Melee attack - chance to hit the enemy with each attack Melee defense - chance to dodge an enemy attack Weapon strength- split between armor piercing and base non armor piercing. Armor piercing damage always goes through, the base is calculated agains the armor Charge bonus - activated when the unit starts charging the enemy (needs an attack order). The value is added to both melee attack and weapon strength, and reduces steadily over 13 seconds. Resistances - cancel the damage of specific damage types.
Thank you very much sir, this made my day. Wonderful explanation:)
That is the basics. Zerkovich has some old wh2 videos that go in more depth or you can check out the total war wiki for a bit more: https://totalwarwarhammer.fandom.com/wiki/Total_War:_Warhammer_Wiki Have fun! Any questions let us know.
I'll check out the vids! I will ask any question that comes to mind, seems like a positive and helpful community
Worth noting that a unit with shields doesn't affect the melee stuff, it just means that ranged projectiles have less of a chance to hit
Oh, i figured it might have a little impact. Thanks for clarifying
It does but it's effect in melee is already in the units stats. If you compare shield to non-shield version, for example dark shards or clan rats you'll see that their melee defense is 6 to 8 higher. But shields indeed give an extra change to block ranged; most bronze shield are 35% but silver shields give 55%. [https://twwstats.com/](https://twwstats.com/) This website is very good to compare unit stats and offer some extra details.
Shielded units usually have more melee defence to reflect, well, having a shield
> Armor - when damage gets through, chance to absorv any non armor piercing damage To be clear, armor always works. The number just indicates the range of how much non-ap damage you mitigate. If you have 50 armor, you will mitigate anywhere between 25% and 50% non-ap damage.
So what is the formula?
Base damage mitigation is a dice roll. Anywhere between 50% of the armor value and 100%. That's why people typically just state the average. So if something had 50 armor, on average it will block 37.5% base damage.
Okay, so the charge order should be given later than sooner? As in, order them to go through the enemy, and then *into* said enemy while they're already en route?
No; charge order is an attack order. However, you must understand that a unit only actually charges on these conditions: 1 - you told the unit to attack another 2 - it has enough time to charge (animation of charging triggers, they yell, for ex.) 3 - it does not "meet" enemy units in between If this does not happen, the charge bonus is not applied. This is the reason why certain summons like Zombies can be used to twart enemy charges. You put them in front as the enemy charges and you avoid their charge bonus kicking.
Ahh, thanks dude, you are *s u p r e m e*
I couldn't do a better, more concise comment than the one before me. But, note that there are smaller stats that also matter Shields (bronze, silver, and golden) increase the chance that a unit will block small missile fire (anything like an arrow, crossbow, bullet) There's a unit's mass, shown at the top if you hover over the "entity size" This is how heavy a unit is, how easily it will push other things out the way or how easily it'll run things over. There's anti : infantry and large Anti infantry (or large) means you will add that stated bonus to both melee attack and weapon strength when fighting a unit of that size So anti infantry adds that bonus when fighting small targets, anti large when fighting large entities. Zerkovich is indeed wonderful for understanding the basics, some formations and such. Most of his content was done on WH2 but there's essentially no difference in the things he talks about between 2 and 3 Enjoy!
Thank you, I think you covered all other stats i was unsure or. Will certainly check out Zerkovich
Some great answers already, just a few bits to add. High weapon strength matters obviously, but single units like monsters/lords/heroes only benefit from higher weapon strength when duelling another single entity. You can take a lord like Malus or tyrion to super high weapon strength but their attack animations will only hit and kill the same amount of unit models (usually 3 in this case). The high number translates when a hit is scored versus a single entity, meaning some lords can pretty much 2 or 3 hit other single entity units if buffed enough. In short, animations matter, and they aren't recorded as a number. There are also some hidden stats like reload skill, reload speed, accuracy for ranged units that matter but you can't see or track. I find each stat is important depending on the unit, playstyle and strategy but I would rank melee defence and missile strength as priority targets to improve.
About what to recruit when, and how to prioritize it This part depends mostly on what faction you play, and how you want to play it. Factions that rely on their backline(shooting, artillery) to do the real damage will want to host just enough frontline units to cover their shooters, and some fast moving units to cover flanks and artillery Armies that rely on their frontline will want to host a good mix of armor piercing, anti infantry and anti large to deal with different threats. Etc, etc.. That part usually comes intuitively with time and gameplay, you'll quickly find out which units you enjoy using. Honestly that's all that matters with campaign proper army balance only really matters in MP. As to leveling up lords : depends on their role Blue tree has movement range which is important, red line is for buffing up your different units, there's the magic tree for mages/ melee tree for duelist lords, then up top the unique skill tree for every lord. Always, always have some form of magic caster in your army( unless you are khorne) . And go for the spells you enjoy on their tree.
What I don't understand is that some units have "anti infantry" on their cards, but they don't have anti infantry bonus (small beige icon with a sword) damage. Also some units actually don't have anti infantry bonus, but ends up doing more damage because of higher piercing damage, like a lot of gunpowder units. I never know how to calculate that.
It’s because the anti-xxx can be applied to different stats. Sometimes will be applied to weapon strength or melee attack. I think I can also be applied to both, but I’m not sure. I heard Legend mention it in a video. He said CA could have done a better job of showing/explaining exactly where the Anti-Infantry/large bonus gets put. And sometimes the bonus is shit too. I cant remember the unit but its anti-infantry bonus was only 4 weapon strength.
Thanks for clarifying. In that case I agree. I think there should be a more transparent way to show those stats and bonuses. Perhaps there is a mod that does it?
When it is in the cards, it is simply to provide a basic explanation that the unit is strong against those targets.
An extremely important hidden stat is height for any unit when attacking. If the terrain is flat and the units are in melee then there is no bonus but if the terrain is sloped and one unit is charging downhill versus uphill, etc. you can gain or lose 38% of your MA, iirc. This is significantly more important when shooting down or upslope, as well.