Which Daemon Soul Grinder is BEST? - Total War Warhammer 3 

Some dope cinematics in this one, if I do say so myself What are some other topics you'd like me to cover in the coming days? Also to everyone discussing the Khorne Growth topic, Khorne can indeed have the best growth in the game, but ONLY if you are min maxing like crazy, spending a ton of time ensuring that you always summon Blood Hosts, always manually fight every battle, max out Bloodletting for all those armies, and are spending 20+ hours to get to turn 8 lol. That is very efficient and effective, but it is NOT a realistic playstyle that most people using Khorne will use. This is another case where Legend's playstyle is skewing how people think the faction actually plays for the average person. The average person does not spend 20 hours getting to turn 8 lol. From the standpoint of baseline growth where people aren't pushing the faction to absolute limit, Khorne's growth is substantially worse than many other races in the game. With that said, if maxing your cities early is very important to you, Growth booming is absolutely a viable strat with Khorne. It will just take a lot of work

The real soul grinder was the friends we made along the way

An important point about the Slaanesh soulgrinder: It's the only armoured unit in the Slaanesh roster, and the only source of AP anti-large. I think that, combined with its much greater monster dueling/cav killing potential than the KoS are very good compensation for its lower speed. Also, after seeing some testing of the Khorne Soulgrinder, I was kind of expecting it to be the best of the bunch. Its missile DPS vs infantry/cav is pretty crazy, and with 120 range, fire while moving, 40 ammo, and 75 speed, it'll be a nightmare for a lot of factions to deal with (ex: Warriors of Chaos, Vampire Counts, and Greenskins), and looks like it will play a really important anti-skirmish role for khorne; it's like a necrofex that trades ~60% of its range for drastically better mobility and better combat stats. If the opposing army doesn't have long ranged missiles (particularly AP) and cavalry to shut it down, it can easily kite/cycle charge well over its cost in infantry. If it's alive and the enemy mobility is dead, kiting from Khorne Soul Grinders/skullcannons would be extremely powerful. Granted, the Nurgle Soulgrinder obviously plays a key role in the roster by being a long-ranged threat. Nurgle is slow, but it doesn't have many ways to force the opponent to engage it. The Soul Grinder is pretty much the only option for that role, so in the context of the roster, it's clearly the most important of the 4, followed by the Slaanesh Soulgrinder, which, again, fills an entirely unique role in the roster.

Shame the tzeentch version has a weaker than usual ranged attack, the ranged attack itself is really awesome looking.

The Soulgrinder of Khorne is probably the more fitting I feel, since they already have demon engines. The Nurgle one is the best looking though

Soul Grinder does fill a specific niche in the Tzeentch roster tho: it's the only single entity force in Tzeentch roster that you can sent into melee slaughter without having to worry about. All the others Tzeentch single entities seems better as doing ranged damage behind the line instead. Could be very good at working as a "bodyguard", stalling/slowing down a melee foe approaching your caster lords

Love the way the Soul Grinders look, the designs are truly amazing. Would have liked to see some more stat variations on the Soul Grinders to better differentiate between the different factions they belong to. Something like +10 or +15 melee attack and/or a base weapons strength increase for the Khornate one, 100 speed for the Slaaneshi one, lower speed but +1000 or +2000 hp for the Nurgle one and a magic strength amplifier or a bound spell for the Tzeentchian variant perhaps.

The way the Khorne and Slaanesh ones squared up in sync at 0:09 made me laugh so hard.

Seeing the Slaaneshi soul grinder using those sound attacks was awesome, reminds me of the emperors children noise marines. All these little hints make me feel like total war 40k is next

I really appreciated the comparison. it's something I've really been wondering, though I'm shocked it's Tzeentch's grinder that's the worst, for now. I thought it'd be Slaanesh's

I saw some testing of the Slaanesh Grinder from Dahv plays that indicated it might just be a better duelist than Keepers of Secrets if you're targetting SEMs. Had a convincing toe-to-toe with a bloodthirster whereas the Keeper got wrecked. If that holds out, it should be a pretty solid pick when you expect your opponent to bring big gribblies. The comments about its survivability have me wondering how it compares to Keepers on that front, too. Slaanesh has a glass anvil problem and, at least on paper, the Grinder seems like something that could hold its own better than a lot of the rest of the roster. Probably not something you want to throw into huge blobs of infantry (Fiends seem better suited for that), but it might be useful for keeping other targets occupied while Slaanesh's faster units reposition and prepare for a countercharge. Kind've expensive for a role like that, though. It's speed seems like it's biggest Achilles heel, all things considered.

I actually like how each of the solar grinders have their own unique animations, take into account their weapons et cetera. Also it looks like the big bears are in the “Big monsters having duelling animations with each other” club.

This list made me realize that having a Soul Grinder army is one of the upsides to choosing the Undivided dedication for the Daemon Prince as doing so allows you to get all of the Soul Grinder types. Khorne Grinders hold the front lines, Slaanesh Grindrs come in as a pincer maneuver, while Nurgle Grinders act as supporting artillery.

Yoooo! Shout out to Trowa Barton indeed! Heavy Arms was never my favorite, but damn if he wasn't an absolute beast on the battlefield regardless. Tragically so.

that one little foot soldier at 1:00 running away with everything he's got cracks me up so hard

I feel like they should have given the Khorne grinder the flamethrower the special Necrofex gets instead of the (seemingly unreliable) 3 shot cannon, that way it's still usable as that fire-before-melee intent but then can still fire it while in said melee grind and would work a bit to differentiate it further from the other 3. It seems like the only real infantry focused grinder is Nurgle's but that's really only because it's a walking mortar. Plus think of the animations, beyblade flamethrower? and maybe the flamethrower makes it more volatile upon death and instead of disintegrating like all other demons it explodes as a death effect to take as many skulls and as much blood back to Khorne as it can

Every single time I see "Soul Grinder (Nurgle)" it just grinds my gears so bad. :P Great video though, I was actually really wondering about this topic. Thanks for that.

I like that the rival gods’ engines have the same role yet do them differently. Really hammers the thematic rivalry between the gods.

"they are here to stay" me, looking at the steam worshop: haha, yes.

Maybe the Tzeentch soul grinder could be good if you know your enemy is bringing elite cav, the shotgun spread of it seems like it’d be good at taking down multiple models.

The deamon princes in the background are dope as hell

8:02 I was not prepared for that sorority girl roast, made me spit out my dang drink man!

Khorne has sub-standard growth?! (1:30) Doesn't he have an ability that gives him up to 75 growth factionwide for each army?

I thought I'd hate them but actually they look pretty damn good and as you say, they fit given the forge of souls is a key part of game 3.

Soul Crushers are just chaos gods popping their head into the 40k universe, saying “yo, I need you”, yoinking them away from the battle against the space marines and plopping them against bear cavalry

8:30 Those debuffs sound like "Reinforce me with yer cav when they try to kill me." For Chaos Undecided I'm looking at the Nurgle Soul Grinder, which seems to make it impractical for enemies to try and stay at range.

Hope you do a comparison of greater daemons as well.

The things you said about Nurgles soulgrinder is exactly what I was hoping to hear. What a beauty!

It's really nice to see different styles and looks to each unit respective to their own chosen chaos god. Instead of the crappy same texture just different colour which the chaos warriors are suffering from l.

I think what the Tzeench Soul Grinder is going to be good at wreckign with its missiles is heavy/monstrous cav. That missile damage is going to kill most models it will hit, and since each bolt can strike different targets, it can bleed cav units very quickly.

I want it on record that for some reason I misread the title as "Which Demon is Best Girl" because I'd only just woken up. That'll be all.

thanks for the breakdown. I was actually looking for something like this ,because i was playing Korn and i could not figure out , why my soulgrinders would not fire. now i know and i agree. while they are nice to have and 1 or might always have their purpose , other units can probably surpass them in usefullness. Thanks for the video.

0:09 "Did we just become best friends?" "Yup!"

As soon as I saw these guys I knew I wanted to make a doomstack out of them. Thanks for the showcase.

Love your content, Heavy arms reference sealed the deal on the sub.

Practical or not, doomstacking these is going to be so fun. Also, love the in-depth dive on units! Seeing these in action like this is the best thing we're going to get till we get our chance to get our hands on it.

You know I wanted this video yesterday and look here it is

Nurgle have the most beautiful and happy one. That s all that count!!!

The kislevites running from the mortar give me war flashbacks to the wrath gate cinematic XD

That intro alone makes me want to eat ice cream. Even if it's still cold out here.

I'm super impressed that even the melee animations of the Soul Grinders are different for the variants. That's really cool.

Amazing video! I was thinking about this exact topic the other day! Can always count on you Indy!

I feel like getting 2 soul grinders of khorne on your flanks to screen from skirmish cav (120 range is pretty much their range, it doesnt get over 140 and getting througth 20 range to shoot with 75 speed unit is easy) instead of investing in harpies and doggos will become solid strat in multi and we will actually see very little bloodthirsters due to soul grinders filling single entity fighter role good enought (in army, that already is great in meele) while also providing so necessary in khorne range attacks. Nurgle one is awsome mass murderer, tzeench has very few shots so you have to put it where it needs to be: in meele as its one of, if not the only one single entity of tzeench that feels comfortable in meele. You put it in, loose shield, get out to replenish, use few shots go back and repeat. Slaanesh lacks in armour and Antilarge. This thing fixes it very well, so giving it extra movement is not necessary. You got other tools to pin down enemy, its here to slay it.

i feel like there should be different types of melee defence, one for large entities and one for human sized ones. It makes more sense that a giant monster wouldnt be able to dodge attacks from people nipping at its feet but would still be able to defend against attacks from other monsters at its eye level

Keep up the Warhammer vids like this one, man. Loving these.

It'd be awesome to start seeing how the rock paper scissors effect of the daemon factions. Such as showing off the best playstyle against khorne, tzeentch, nurgle, and slaanesh while also showing off which monogods will excel against who. Since they're all so unique I'm sure it'd make a great video!

I’ve only ever played ordertide in TW:W but WH3 might change this with these cool chaos factions.

I was expecting the Khornate one to have like a flamethrower or something. Like a warpfire thrower on steroids

Soulgrinders kinda remind me of mixture of Serious Sam and Doom kind of enemy.

What's the controversy surrounding Soul Grinders? Seen some people complaining about them but I dont really know why, can someone explain it to me?

I don't think there is enough visual difference between them. Here are my artistic suggestions: Khorne: The metal body should be an iron red and covered in chunks of mutilated flesh, with what looks like a huge flaming diesel engine on the back. Nurgle: Machine body should look very rusted and covered in grease and grime. With a large leaking oil tank on the back. Tzeetnch: Whole body should be a machine. All following Tzeench's color scheme with a more arcane/digital appearance. Slaanesh: Bio-mechanical, the whole thing and no sharp or straight edges. Like Bob Giger's Xenomorph. All smooth, round and curvy but still mechanical.

Damn, did not expect that Trowa Barton GW reference from hell in this comparison XD can't wait to use these maschines of war myself

I think the Tze Soul Grinder is more of a distraction than a monster sniper, trying to keep the enemy fast units chasing after it rather than you squishy units

That Trowa Barton line had me laughing hard af

I can tolerate them, but I would definitely prefer them to be less mechanical. Kind of how Vermintide's design departed from the original for Stormfiends, which were basically just Rat Ogres in power armor and turned them into something more gritty and Frankenstein-y instead of making them Rat Space Marines. Could've definitely done a better job.

I can imagine the Everqueen literally shitting herself after taking a direct hit from the Nurgle Soul grinder. That makes them the best.

The 40k-only version is the best. :V But I guess visually the Tzeentch one is quite snazzy.

"This thing vomits like a sorority girl after a weekend bender... and looks like one too" Hahahahaha still laughing

I never got the hate for Soul Grinders. They are a Daemons of Chaos unit; they were in the army book. Now if they were, say, Heldrakes or Maulerfiends, then yeah, not the game for them.

I am really surprised their base stats are so similar. I am also surprised that Khorne has the lowest leadership and Tzeentch the highest. It seems a weird for their leadership stat to be different at all.

Went 200 some turns on kugath with the nurgle soul grinders. Putting 2 in every army let's you win the ranged battle or any siege you manually do. Thought I'd get 1 of each near the end of my campaign, having alliances with each. Tried using them all as ranged without even realizing they were all a little different, watching the 2 melee start rushing ahead of my line.

do you think the strider on the slaanesh one might help it a bit more as well in its role? fighting in forests, not being slowed by uphill movement, and being able to fight uphill opponents without having terrain disadvantage could make up for the speed being the same? thinking the 20% attack and defense penalty of forest along with its debuff on targets could make it a really powerful duelist that the stats might not show fully

A point about the Tzeentch soul grinder is that it's about the only non winds of magic option for knocking out artillery without committing troops to a suicide run. Short range missile units and fairly squishy high mobility units with poor mass means if there's protected artillery you wont be taking it down easily. Your average Tzeentch armies are going to hate cheap artillery effective against low armor like mortars in multiplayer. You'll have to sink a fair bit of WOM, troops, and or micro to wipe out a fairly low cost artillery piece. I'd be curious to see how effective it as at counterbattery, especially compared to the magic missile option. It could prove invaluable in certain match-ups as a tool for freeing up winds of magic for more important fights.

@milkandcookiesTW saw this video, said oo and clicked on it- only for you to start off saying oo the exact same way! Love it!

Khornate SG seems very good but requires pretty intense micro to get the most out of. Versus slower units you can kite them around and blast them until they are low enough to take them out in melee. As you mention, in a supportive role they seem good as well. I could see them working well in the rest of the khorne roster as you create a tarpit and use the Khorne SGs to blast from relatively close range, who can still hold their own in melee if they get caught by cav. They have a crap ton of ammo at 40, so it seems the intended design is either to do one of two things. 1. Spend the early portion of the fight blasting troops, kiting, blasting troops, run out of ammo, and go in melee. and/or 2. Play a game of "shoot shoot shoot" - charge - cycle charge - "shoot shoot shoot", basically cav with shotguns.

My personal favourite is Khorne one, at least because of that badass sword he swings.

I just realised how impressive those plague drone wing animations are

Sweet animations on these. I like Nurgle gets a decent artilery piece. Was kinda hoping the Tzeentch one would be more relevant. But we'll see in the final build, off course. thanks for the video Indy

Laser eyes. The best one has the laser eyes. In all seriousness, these look rad. I just wish the colors and patterns of the metal legs were vastly more different. Rusted and orange on Nurgle's, shining gold trim for Tzeentch, and big gaudy crystals for Slaanesh! (Khorne's is already perfect). And of course, they need the respective God's symbol on their legs, not just the 8-pointed star. Although that DOES give me hope the Warriors of Chaos will be getting one down the line! They already have Hellcanons, so I'm hoping their Grinder gets some kind of gun.

I like the tzeentch one, maybe they should give it wings lmao 🐦

I think it would be quite cool to see the Tzeentch Soul Grinder get some Luminark Of Hysh or Ikit's Zap-Zap type effects to add more utility and flavor to it? Basically turning the "single entity sniper" unit, into an anti-magic locus because Tzeentch be like that?

Indypride back with the good content the internet was made for

I know the Tzeentch grinder doesn't look like much, and I never really took it seriously until I saw it delete half of an ironbreaker's HP in one volley.

I think the Tzeentch souldgrinder is just for blobbing up the enemy units to obliterate them with magic and range attacks so the reverse situaton for the nurgle one where the infantry binds the enemy

These get me excited for a warhammer 40k total war

It's always one of the 3 I didn't choose, because the grass is always greener on the other side...

i think i'd tend to agree with you Indie, the unique abilities of each soul grinder are amazing but i'd like to see some genuine stat differences to really accentuate their abilities. give Khorne more armour, charge and frenzy and maybe Gorefeast. Slaanesh more Speed (95), MA/MD and AP but less health Nurgle more Heath and less speed (maybe 50) and Tzeentch some bound spells and ammo and maybe even a flamer precursor attack. just my thoughts, im by no means a game or balance dev but i think it would be alot cooler if each soul grinder was a true and proper representation of its Chaos god and also filled a Niche in their armies that was maybe lacking.

So excited for this game only 23 more days

Tzeentch one seems to be a better Horse deleter than big entities. If those bolts pierce, the damage on cavalry can be pretty high.

I would think there will probably be campaign and lord bonuses in Slaanesh's factions that will boost the speed of it's soul grinders. So with those and it's strider bonus, I think it'll do more than you might think at a glance.

Thank you for the Gundam wing reference

Hopefully they will make a Chaos undivided Soulgrinder in the future! Also as a side note: Look at those grubs on the left hand side at 10:07 Such a cool little disgusting detail to the map!

I’m praying Nurgle is at least decent on legendary/very hard battles. It’s the faction I’m most looking forward to playing

Hey, Indy! Since you mentioned the power of healing: Do single entities lose their Wounds debuff(s?) when healed back past a certain threshold or to full, or are those permanent debuffs no matter what?

8:01 mans has some beef with sorority girls 😂😂😂😂

It would be super niche but a game where you could back and forth between fantasy and 40k as a soul grinder or some kind of demon would be pretty cool. It would also be cool if the metal parts would stay behind after soul grinders die.

Sooo.. 1 - Nurgle: Gets the best toy 2 - Slaanesh: Goes for glory like everything else in the army 3 - Khorne: Can't help but charge. At least does it well 4 - Tzeentch: Forgot its flamer in the warp. Looks like the Khorne one should be able to shoot and the Tzeentch one needs an alternate AoE fire and more ammo

I love endurance battle and range so I’m happy nurgle has a possible doom stack with this unit

I cannot wait to play Nurgle. My absolute favorite Chaos God.

I think this is a pretty good example of how the context of a roster makes a significant difference to the merit of a unit. Nurgle's one isn't particularly good value, but it has one of the few long-range attacks in a slow melee army, and gives you the only tool to force an enemy to engage that doesn't use your Lord slot. Slaanesh's one is less exciting than the others with no ranged attack, but it has huge AP and anti-Large in an army that can usually only do that with their Lord, and with the debuff and phys resist it can stand in combat longer than the rest of the force. The Tzeentch and Khorne ones seem a little better in a vacuum, but end up being less essential to their armies. It's good to have discussion like this that consider the context carefully, given so much talking around TWH balance is driven by vacuum comparisons.

That Gundam Wing reference.

I definitely agree but the khorne sword is too cool

Look at those animations!

I’ll tel you that Nurgle’s Soul Grinder is the one I get depressed when I see it. It literally 50% Tzar Guard. And knocks off 60% of Ice Guard per volley (before ward save)

The "zzz" icon on idle units really makes it look like they're all sleeping in the midst of battle.

I really wanna see what Chaos Undivided is going to look like.

Papa knows best.

"Khorne has substandart growth." Me: * opens up Legend's stream who leveled up Infernus to tier 4 in 10 turns. *

Since chariots are broken (in a bad way) I think Slaanesh SG is vital to broke enemy formations, plus it´s the only thing with some good old armor...

so like how does the lore of the soul grinders fit in? Where do the demons get the tech or engineering skill for this?