The Trick Almost Everyone Gets Wrong 

Isnt it useless for multiplayer, unless you want to have line of sight on your gunners?

It's to prevent an enemy charge from getting into melee range of 2 units at once, and to lessen the impact of spells like Winds of Death (though that is more a multi-player issue)

@@RUSDiaboliko yeah it's pretty useless in multiplayer

@@RUSDiaboliko Checkerboard is mostly a deployment to use with archers and against the AI. It's counterable in multiplayer because it gives diagonal lines for wind spells, and it doesn't do so well with gunpowder units because they can block each other's line of fire. This is pretty much the case for most approaches to army comp and deployment, multiplayer and campaign are different metas and what works in one is often actively harmful to do in the other.

i actually really needed this explanation, thank you! it has been so frustrating having to micro-manage my missile infantries every move because they just can't stay in formation..

@@hakonhenriksen9651 hovering over and reading helps alot.

@@deezboyeed6764 ain't got time for that shit

Turning off guard mode means your ranged units will wander into the thick of the fight. I also sometimes put guard mode on my front line to prevent them from chasing cavalry or skaven if I want to keep the frontline tight

@@hakonhenriksen9651 As a general rule, on battle start I put all my units, bar cavalary, on guard mode - it is virtually essential for standard missile troop use. Also make sure you turn off skirmish mode at the beginning of every battle - the AI is so broken that the unit doesn't always flee in the opposite direction of incoming troops, and also you cannot give any orders to units currently moving because of skirmish mode.

*Chosen sad noises*

I think it does. Had a similar thing happen with Ogre Maneater Pistols. I noticed some of the back rows would still fire even in melee. At the time I thought thought this was part of their melee attack animation but this video makes me wonder otherwise. One thing I noticed about the Ogre Pistols is that their ammo didn't seem to go down in this manner. Heck, there was one time when they were actually out of ammo and they would still fire in melee combat. (which makes me think it's a bug OR them shotting really is just part of their melee animations).

That's a great joke, my Streltzi will often not fire at all even when not engaged. Instead they just dance around in formation. The rest of my Kislev mixed units I force into melee. Otherwise they both lose out on the charge bonus, refuse to brace against the coming charge, and will seldom fire even when given the best opportunity.

@@storytsunami ogres do use their pistols in melee

@@tomatoesofdoom I've seen that. But I was wondering if that's one of their melee animations, or if it uses up ammo just like when they're firing at range.

Props for mention Empire and Napoleon, my first Total War games 😄

it is in S2 too and really important in Multiplayer so your super powerful gun unit doesnt move out of position and keeps firing at whatever they can see when enganged

Guard attitude helping firing units in formation not to run away from the main fight trying to pursue broken enemy, or break lines, which happens all the time if you don't micromanage them constantly. So for longer range units, I mean 130 or more, it is good idea to keep them in formation, especially if you are focused on spells at the time.

@@DarkDragonRus The first half of that was a real challenge to read. And I'm unsure how it connects to my comment. Just saying how older information may have translated over. Nothing to do with how the mechanics work in TW:Warhammer

@@TheStormfury in a nutshell I thinks he is saying that the reason it's mentioned is so that archers don't chase and fire at routing units and stay in formation to focus on nearby enemies. So I guess he's explaining why it's mentioned in tw Warhammer tips for players

@@silverazrael9562 That makes sense.

If they've not got good targets, it's better to hold the ammo. Especially for artillery that only have partial regiments to fire at or engaged ones where they may cause friendly fire, it might cost you more of your balance of power to spend the ammo than you will take from the enemy.

@@AshenVictor only in extreme cases, unless your hitting more friendlies then enemies most times you will be gaining balance of power, artillery less so, but most ranged weapons will deal more then enough damage to justify them on even the worst targets

Great point, underrated comment. I knew about guard mode etc, but hadnt considered the inverse. Thanks for sharing that point.

seconding this question

Yeah, there's an "any unit as lord" mod, and one which adds a number of custom sized perfectly flat maps for custom battles.

@@AshenVictor thanks, but what about making AI do what you want them to?

@@watyh3019 That's mostly a case of knowing what the AI is going to do in any given situation and planning for it. The AI is reactive and predictable, so you can engineer the outcomes you want.

The game is such a mess. Archers can blindfire over walls and reliably kill characters. Gunners can shoot through their own without harming them. In a game where the single player meta is based on missile troops, those very troops are the most broken. And it will never be fixed!

Gotta have realism in my game with giant monsters and interdimensional horrors

I've certainly never seen a unit with blasting charges use them once it gets into melee, fire at will or no. Fanatics are a command ability not a shooting attack.

@@AshenVictor they do use them

@@AshenVictor weird, i always see ironbreakers do this when they are in meele... ive always guard on as dwarfes and fire at will....the front ones fight in meele while those in the back shoot some explosives if the unit isnt too close because the explosives have a minimum range iirc

Ironbreakers and miners can use blasting charges while in melee, but not on the unit they're in melee with. They have a minimum range like artillery so they can't fire at units once they get too close. But if you put them in guard mode you can tell them to throw their blasting charges at another unit that's further away. Nigh goblin fanatics' loons are a unit ability, not a ranged attack that uses ammunition, so that doesn't really make a lot of sense. You should pretty much always wait until they're in melee before you use the loons though because the enemy unit will be packed much closer together.

@@AshenVictor it’s possible

In single-player, many of the best archer/ranged builds Are also stealth builds, such as Chameleon Skinks, Shades, Waystalkers, or Shadow Walkers (only with Alith Anar). If fire at will is on, you'll lose the ability to hide from the moment the enemy goes too close.

@@EagleScoutmano that's a very specific group yes, in that case you would keep if off if required. But 2 points. 1. Many of those units have snipe so it wouldn't matter 2. Those are not 'front line' missle troops they are skirmishers and would avoid melee so it wouldn't really apply to them much.

@@lindagoad2163 None of the units you mentioned have snipe. You wouldn't usually put your ranged units up front to take the charge anyway, you want them to be dealing damage. Directing your fire is almost always better than letting your units just fire freely. It just costs you concentration to that could be better used elsewhere.

@@ruukinen chameleon skinks have snipe if you play as oxytl, the shades don't need it as nothing gets near them (and they are more than adequate frontline troops as by the time anyone gets near them as with 200 plus range, nothing does) and the other two can kite anyone to death. Maybe they don't have snipe, but they neither need it nor require management with firing. If you like to micro that's fine but all 4 units can destroy almost anything set against them.

@@lindagoad2163 Sure? It's still better to micro them and you did talk out of your ass when saying that most of them have snipe when just one of them do in a very specific circumstance. When the situation is real tough, fire at will won't cut it.

I imagine this is going to be applicable to terrifying effect with those gun/axe hybrid guys Kislev will get in TWW3...

I miss the days when rank-firing actually had your units kneel and fire in ranks... When a bullet was a bullet and an arrow was an arrow that hurt someone if it hit them, rather than a calculation that met another calculation and spat out some numbers to a whole regiment's HP...

Hit chance is 35+MA-MD, with a lower bound at 8% and upper bound at 90%. Armour reduces all non-AP damage by between 50% and 100% of its value with a minimum of 1 damage. Armour works completely normally against magic and fire damage, those only interact with Resistances. Damage is reduced by the sum of all applicable resistances with a maximum of 90%, so a Magic Fire attack (like Sisters of Avelorn) against Irondrakes would be reduced by 90% not 105%, whereas a Physical Fire attack (like another unit of Irondrakes) would be reduced by 70%. Again with a minimum of 1 damage*. In Warhammer 3 Magic Resistance will only affect spells not attacks. AFAIK Fire is the only resistance which can go negative and allow more than normal damage to be caused, other resistances bottom out at 0 if you have items or abilities which reduce them. *Though if a unit has enough of both armour and resistances it can in practice receive no damage because they multiply. This is a difficult circumstance to achieve though.

@GloatingSwine Well thanks a lot to begin with Some more questions for specifications: First: Magic and Physical damage replace each other, while fire dmg is an addition? And for the entire damage calculation the resistences are just ADDED? So against a unit with for example 80% physical, 20% magic and 5% fire resist a Physical+Fire attack only deals 15% and a Magic Fire Attack deals 75% of its dmg (if it hits and after armor calc and stuff ofc)? Second: How do projectiles work with resistances and Projectileresistenc in particular? Do Siege weapons count towards it? And should'nt a simple SUM easily get into high resistences against something like Magic Fire projectiles? I mean ward Save + Fire resist + Magic resist + Projectile resist? should easily get to 70-90% so i wonder why the high tear units often have the flame + magic combination and seem to deal lots of dmg with it. And last: The charge bonus seems to increase the hit chance (so MA i guess) but the damage aswell? And what are the mathematics behind it Thanks a lot for the time :) Im really curious and i love numbers :D

@@anan007as my guy, there's legit several in-depth explanations for this on RU-vid already. Love 'im or hate 'im, LegendofTotalWar has a very good video on the way that resistances stack. To answer your last questions, charge bonus is applied additively to both MA and weapon strength, with reducing effect over something like 12 seconds, but that doesn't show up as an active ability (it really should), so you don't see those stat changes. Resistances stack additively, so it is super easy to get to the 90% resistance cap against magic fire missile attacks, since many units (mainly Lords/Heroes) can reach 20-30% DR against each separate category, plus 10+% ward save. However, magic missiles are almost completely useless against single entities anyway, since they're easily dodged by fast units and frequently miss on individual foot lords.

@@AshenVictor Found the video thanks sir :) did not know about his channel until your comment

​@@anan007as Yeah, all attacks are either magic or physical, and either fire or not-fire. Applicable resistances get added together. As far as I am aware, any attack which *uses ammunition* is counted as a missile attack for the purposes of missile resistance (So "magic missile" type spells and abilities are not). Missile resistance affects both small arms and artillery fire. Shields only affect small arms (Shields are a percentage chance for the shot to be blocked entirely and all damage negated from hits taken within a 120 degree arc to the unit's front, even if graphically the shield is on the unit's back*). And yes, it is quite easy to get high levels of resistance against projectile attacks if you can stack the right ones. (In my last High Elves campaign Malekith got a dragonbane gem early on which meant he could tank sisters fire all day, which was a pain.) You'll still see high damage numbers from units like Sisters which have three applicable resistances because *most* units don't have good resistance combinations, and the AI doesn't build its lords for resistances except by accident. The thing about resistances is that they're asymptotically useful, the more you have the more useful it is to get more. If you go from 0%-50% resistance you double your effective health, but you only need to go from 50%-75% to double it again, half as much extra resistance gives twice as much value. Charge bonus is a fiddly one, Charge bonus is added to both Melee Attack and Weapon Strength and decays linearly over 13 seconds from the point the unit enters combat. If the unit being charged has Charge Defence then this doesn't happen. Only fighters in the front rank get charge bonus (since the cavalry patch, applying charge bonus to all ranks was why AP infantry used to mince cavalry on a countercharge). Charges also have Impact Damage which is based on the mass of the unit, before the units actually enter combat a certain amount of damage is applied to the unit being charged (I think if two units are charging each other then the one with higher unit mass deals its impact damage). (This, I think, is how swooping works, because the impact damage is applied before you actually enter contact you can, with sufficient micro, give a charge order to a flying unit then disengage it after the impact damage but before it enters melee). *Total War Troy can apply shield block to the rear of units and does so when units like Guards of Troy switch their spears to two handed, but I do not think Warhammer does this, shields on the back of eg. Quarellers are just graphical they still count as being to the front.

The broken missile meta continues.

I mean shades are a high tier hybrid missile/melee infantry and dwarf warriors are a low tier unit with a super low damage output. It's not like historical titles where heavy armor means they're elite, they're a pretty weak unit that just has a lot of armor, and shades have great AP. The missile infantry meta is mostly just a thing in singleplayer because the AI is dumb, it's really not nearly as much of a thing in MP.

@@N0ahface Doesn't change that range is still much stronger than infantry. MP they just focus them down and are not stupid like the AI

@@pickleinspector5948 So then it totally does change it, ranged is a glass cannon and in multiplayer it isn't particularly dominant. It's only overpowered against people who are bad at the game.

@@N0ahface Yeah for sure but looking at my MP matches, I notice that most of the time, my ranged units have better cost effectivness than my infantry. Like it's quite easy to get value from regular HE archers but swordmasters really struggle to get value since SE meta ruins infantry super hard

Guard mode will stop them from moving out of position if a target moves out of their fire arc. If you give an attack order on something that's not currently in arc they'll still move to target it. For melee units it cancels their current attack order when the thing they're fighting breaks so they stop, ranged units will still keep shooting until it leaves their fire arc then stop.

I think Oscar meant fire at will

@@sjonnieplayfull5859 No sorry, poorly worded, I was referring to when a ranged unit is engaged in melee, but you want it to target a different unit (not in melee combat with).

@@191Oscar dont think that is possible, that would be like targetting two units at once: one with melee, the other with ranged. Stegadon mains would be very interested

@@sjonnieplayfull5859 I believe you can mate! Jump in a custom with some irondrake torpedos and an undead dragon + chaf

You don't plan on getting flanked, or to have your lines overun, but sometimes you are, and knowing how best to handle that is important

How are they able to shoot through their own units when they have enemy units right in front of them? xd? There is literally no other ally unit in front of them

but they are always able to shoot through their own unit models not just in the melee combat lol

Hey, the video said that loose formations do this better, so it is more like frontline gaps tactic, but within one unit.

it looks pretty goofy, when the "frontline" of a missile unit (10 men) can hold back a complete melee unit, so that others can fire?!?! shouldn't melee units break through this, instead of staying back and wait to get shot? that's why you need to spam click as attacker. that's annyoing and i count this as bug

@@HomerJSimpson999 I get what you are saying, but in that train of thought every gun unit would be useless, because none of them would be able to fire through their own unit and only the front row would be able to fire.

I used a mod to get the map. Very likely we'll get the same mod for WH3

@@Enticity Thanks for the answer !

I didn't try it out but I think it'd work as long as the unit doesn't get enveloped. Though line of sight issues might crop up with the units in the far back. More testing will be needed!

More "sorry for the hole in the back of your head" moments probably. Aiming between two moving heads is not too hard. Firing between seven ranks of moving heads is a challenge...

@@sjonnieplayfull5859 There are almost no units in the game who can hurt themselves.

@@ilesalmo7724 Not tried it out before

@@sjonnieplayfull5859 Units already ignore entities in their own unit for los and hit calculation.

If you're relying on melee units to win, then you want a line if you have the advantage and a column if the enemy has the advantage. If your guys are going to lose then you want as few of them losing at the same time as you can, if your guys are going to win you want as many of them winning at the same time as you can. Though if in doubt use squares, squares are highly versatile, turn quickly, are deep enough to block cav without letting them break through, and form a nice balance of offense vs defence.

@@AshenVictor I play on legendary so my guys are kinda screwed from the start but your advice will be helpful. Thank you for you answer.

Should work. Though I haven't tested skirmishers specifically, they probably work like shades but better.

It works!!! Kislev rejoice!

Uh, no, there still is less tactical depth

Hmmm play shogun 2 Rome Napoleon empire or medieval 2 and compare them to atilla Rome 2 . After that compare them to 3k and troy. After that compare them to Warhammer. Then you'll see something ever so strange yet true.

@@silverazrael9562 I stand by my words

@@silverazrael9562 shogun 2 is probably the worst strategy game ever made, just make the yari wall unit, and watch as the enemy sucides hundreds of men into each unit, hell i had a mirror match fight where I crushed an enemy with the same exact army comp with 0 survivors because they let me pincer there 2 units separately waiting for there units to die from a full surround, the tactical depth isn't deeper, the cheese is just so easy basic tactics result in it

@@calebbarnhouse496 ye shogun 2 yari wall is prolly the worst thing about shogun 2 edit ( you can't however deny the tactics.in.rome.and.medieval 2 compared to Rome 2 and atilla and then how worse they have gotten in Troy and 3k and Warhammer respectively

Just turn off skirmish mode. The method in this video is assuming you let enemy melee charge at your ranged units without withdrawing them. On a side note, you’re usually best off not skirmishing with ranged units anyway especially with slower factions as they will turn and start running too early, after only getting in one or two volleys. If you control them manually you can usually get 3/4 volleys before you need to start running away

Skirmish mode is a trap. You should only use it if you absolutely have to leave a unit which has 360 degree fire on the move to its own devices to urgently micro something else. Otherwise micro your ranged units yourself, Skirmish mode will always make the stupidest decision possible for how to move them.

Skirmish mode off, fire at will on, melee mode off

You can turn off skirmish mode permanently somewhere in the settings menu, it's a hassle to turn it of each combat;D

@@AshenVictor I do like leaving pistoliers on skirmish since they have high speed but they’re pretty much the only unit

Runs pretty smooth for me, maybe you should use another computer to watch with instead of the one you played the original Rome on. Jokes aside though he is playing on a custom map to make it easier to see what exactly happens with the units in these tests. That said it still looks a hundred times better than original Rome which by now looks like a game made in Minecraft on the lowest graphic settings.

its in multiplayer

@@alexvancuren7626 The mechanics of unit behaviour will work the same, the outcomes of specific matchups might be different but they aren't really the point.

what i meant was if the actual trade between shades and the infantry in the video is done on legendary

@@ave5668 no, in multiplayer

@@ave5668 It's probably done in custom battle, which can in principle incorporate difficulty modifiers (though there's no such thing as Legendary battle difficulty), but this is generally more of a multiplayer focused guide channel where those modifiers don't apply.

It does make sense in real life: if the enemy has charged your buddies and are ripping them apart, and there is no space for you to reach them and help, and the enemy will come for you after they are done with your buddies, and so you REALLY want to help your buddies ...... And you happen to have a loaded gun in your hand.... Would you wait untill your buddies in front of you have died and try to hit the enemy with the end of the gun that does not shoot, because you are suppossed to be in melee? Or would you take good aim and give the enemy a facefull of lead?

@@sjonnieplayfull5859 Shooting through six ranks of your friends?

@@SheepWaveMeByeBye I did say 'a good aim', right? Plus when you are that far to the back, you do not see what happens in front that well. If a deamon is stooping over your wounded buddy on the ground right in front of you to finish him off, and you have a loaded rifle in your hand....