Warhammer 3 Immortal Empires Tretch Craventail - Skaven Campaign Overview, Guide And Second Thoughts
Hello everyone. In this guide I will cover:
- Victory conditions, faction and climate;
- Starting location;
- Diplomacy and outposts;
- Mechanics of the race and faction;
- Province edicts and army stances;
- Buildings and research;
- Lords and skills;
- Army compositions;
And give you my final notes on the specific faction. Hope you enjoy it.
If you prefer to watch the video, here is the link, and it also helps to support me:
https://youtu.be/xei8kTzIuhE
If you prefer to read, here we go:
VICTORY CONDITIONS:
Short victory:
- Destroy the factions of the Moon Howlerz and the Knights of Caledor (Imrik);
- Occupy, loot, raze or sack 30 different settlements.
The reward is +3 recruit rank to all units, which for Tretch is just a bit nicer since they do have a bonus for some units relating to their XP.
Very straightforward campaign, very simple goals, it is likely one of the best to get the feel for the faction.
Long victory:
- Achieve the short victory;
- Occupy, loot, raze or sack 75 different settlements;
- Control 7 settlements of a long list. These are mainly Skaven or Dwarf holds, scattered around the map. Tretch is quite close to most of these, so he is in a good position to achieve this.
The reward is +2 to Global recruitment capacity, decent to ensure you can always have your armies in full capacity for the Domination endgame.
Tretch is the Grand Chieftain of the Deep Warrens, benefitting from:
- Scurry Away has improved effects and grants a minor ward save while active.
- Encourage attribute for Stormvermin;
- For 3 turns after declaring a war, Tretch's faction gains:
1 - Ambush success chance +25% (all armies)
2 - Vanguard deployment (all units)
3 - Menace Below +1 use (all armies)
4 - Enemy reinforcement time +50%
- Additional 1 Armor and 1 Base weapon damage per unit experience rank (max 9) for Clanrats and Stormvermin.
Overall, these are quite interesting buffs. Note that the 3 turns is not just towards the faction you are at war with, so you can effectively keep declaring wars on others if you need those bonuses for a current one.
The specific playstyle definitely encourages some cunning and treachery, which is great for a different one.
Climate is good. Other than Ulthuan, nearly everywhere else is either suitable or unpleasant, making this a nice campaign if you wish to go for domination or complete map domination endgame.
STARTING LOCATION:
Starting position is quite difficult, as expanding into any area will only be met with more enemies to take care of.
You have a 3 settlement province, which will help you have some military going, and it is somewhat easy to conquer initially. The main issue is that you will have to contend with some enemy Legendary Lords right at the start (Imrik, Drazhoath) without having too many tools to deal with them.
Typical expansion is to establish a foothold, likely going all the way into the South, and using the Mountains as sort of natural borders. Nothing wrong with trying to go into the North or into the East or West, but you may spread too thin if you are not careful. Planning where to go and how to deal with the enemies you will find is key to winning this campaign.
DIPLOMACY AND OUTPOSTS:
Diplomacy for the Skaven is rather tricky. You do have the possibility of establishing decent relations with the Vampire Counts, Greenskins, and Ogres, mainly because they have little aversion towards you and you will likely be fighting their enemies.
The problem is that for the most part the ones around are minor factions, so you will likely be under trouble if they are ever absorbed or attacked by a major faction. Still, there is the possibility that they survive with your assistance and they can become your allies and allow you outposts. Ogre Monstrous cavalry, Greenskins damage dealing infantry, Vampire Counts cavalry, are all good possibilities for you.
Enemies will most likely be the Order tide for quite sometime. Imrik and the Dwarfs will definitely target you soon rather than later, so gaining alliances with anoyne that is at war with them is a good choice. Be careful with the Chaos Dwarfs, who do have aversion towards you and will not like if you have any treaties with Greenskins.
MECHANICS OF THE RACE AND FACTION:
- Undercities are a nice idea, they provide vision and you can generate food and income, as well as other needed bonuses for your faction. The biggest idea around them is to suddenly shift efforts into the Vermintied, but that costs a lot of resources and may backfire.
- Food is your unique currency, and it is important to keep finding more; this is mainly to avoid suffering penalties than rather for the buffs you can obtain. Food can be used to capture a settlement and turn it into a higher level, which ensures good strategic advantages over other factions.
- Skaven corruption allows you more uses of the Menace Below, and grant you bonuses on that province. It provides food and public order when low, and public order penalties when high, but nothing too detrimental unless you are playing on the highest difficulties.
- An additional mechanic is how the Skaven ambush on their natural stance; every battle you initiate has a chance to become an ambush. Some army compositions are entirely possible just because of this one. Remember that Tretch has increased chance after declaring War, which adds to its playstyle.
- Rites:
1 - The Dominating Scheme, giving 3 food per turn, growth +40, Control +2, and recruitment cost -25%;
2 - The Thirteenth Scheme, giving you diplomatic relations with Skaven +13, lords chance to gain 2 loyalty, hero action success improved by 13%, enemy hero action decreased by 13%, and a powerful army ability that gives anti-large bonuses.
3 - The Pestilent Scheme, giving you a unique Plague Priest Hero, which can spread a plague to a foreign settlement.
4 - The Scheme of DOOOOOM!, which gives you a unique Warlock Engineer Hero, which can establish an Under-City or cause a catastrophic earthquake on it.
- As seen in the abilities from Tretch, he has some nice bonuses after declaring a war, so your playstyle should fit having these declarations of war with some preparation to take maximum advantage of those.
PROVINCE EDICTS AND ARMY STANCES:
Edicts:
Control +3, corruption -2
Growth +20, construction cost -10% for all buildings;
Recruitment cost -5%, local recruitment capacity +1;
Skaven corruption +3, food generated +2;
Very good ones, the recruitment one could be much better since you already have enough recruitment slots at least in large provinces.
Army stances:
Stalking is your natural stance, giving you a chance to ambush any army you attack.
Underway is similar to others, to allow quick movement over impassable terrain.
Channeling gives +15 Winds of Magic per turn, with a 10% movement cost. Considering the advantages of the Stalking stance, this seems a bit underwhelming.
Encamp, costing 50% movement, enabling replenishment and access to global recruitment, as well as immunity to attrition.
Raiding, costing 50% movement, provides food, immunity to most attrition
Ambush, costing 25% movement. This is the waiting to ambush stance, compared to the attacking ambush (stalking).
Forced march.
Overall, very thematic, and I love how many compositions you can get if you focus solely on the Stalking stance.
Warhammer 3 Immortal Empires Tretch Craventail - Skaven Campaign Overview, Guide And Second Thoughts(continuation)
BUILDINGS, RESEARCH:
Similar to the Greenskins, you have additional recruitment capacity with each settlement in a province. This implies your best provinces for recruitment will be the ones with 3 to 4 settlements, there are very few with 4 settlements nearby.
For the buildings, starting with Undercities: they have a unique requirement which is discoverability. Keep that in check, and all goes well. You can then focus on some income, food, or other bonuses. Or even a Vermintide.
Crookback mountain has a unique building, Rictus Great Clan-Hall, giving income, food, trade resources, -20% recruitment cost fos Stormvermin and +2 recruit rank for Stormvermin, as well as giving all Stormvermin immunity to psychology.
You require 6 military buildings for full capacity, with 5 of which having to be built in the province capital for maximum tier.
They have good combos at tier 3, including Stormvermin, catapults, rattling guns, Rat Ogres... they can be effective even at that point, specially in numbers.
All buildings generate income and Skaven corruption.
Infrastructure divides into:
1 - Growth, casualty replenishment rate;
2 - Food, income from buildings;
3 - Corruption denial, recruitment cost;
4 - Control, hero and lord and unit recruitment rank;
Decent ones, which you also should consider to unlock the necessary research.
Speaking of Research, it is fairly extensive, with many techs being locked behind buildings. They give a lot of bonuses to your units, very adequately, and to your campaign in general. There is a particular note that many add units or change units for the Vermintide mechanic, so you can definitely plan those out in advance to have a massive Vermintide later on.
LORDS, SKILLS, ARMY COMPOSITIONS:
The blue line does not have replenishment; however, most lords have that skill in a better way in their specific skills. Tretch himself has a great replenishment skill for his own army.
They go get ambush increase, which plays well into the faction, as well as upkeep decrease which helps getting more and better armies overall.
The redline allows some cool crazy combinations without spending too many skills there. It is definitely one of the most interesting rosters just based on those. They have quite some cheap combinations, and it should be noted that the second part of the redline mixes a bit the units, so make sure you note which one is buffing which units.
In terms of lords and heroes there is so much choice. 5 heroes. All lords buff specific units overall, so there is a lot of nice replay value even if you just want to check some different combinations.
Tretch feels really dedicated to Stormvermin and to Ambush/Flanking attacks, with the Devastating Flanker buffs. Therefore, some combinations of mass melee with fast moving units, as well as some missile to debuff the enemy, should work well and give you some variety. Nothing wrong with instead going into some heavy monsters, or the traditional use of weapons teams.
Warlock masters have some upkeep bonuses for weapons teams, so makes sense to benefit from those. First army is a basic missile stack with just some Warp Grinders to stop anything coming against you that survives.
Assassins favor Night Runners and Gutter Runners, so here are a few compositions around those.
Finally I showcase some comps with the Grey Seers, some Plague monks and some monsters. You can include some weapons teams mixed in, or just a monster-weapons teams based army.
FINAL NOTES:
Tretch has actually an interesting position, being in the middle of things. If you succeed in the early game and establish a foothold, then Tretch can shine as the perfect backstabber. Prepare for war, declare it, and win decisively in those first few turns to get the edge you need.
You can be quite varied with Tretch, but Stormvermin are definitely something to go for in your armies just because of their buffs. Nothing wrong with the typical ranged focus, but Tretch does feel quite ambush focused in his theme.
Your army consists of:
1 - Good infantry
2 - Great missile infantry and artillery
3 - Good monstrous infantry and single entities
4 - Great heroes, and varied
5 - No flying units
6 - No real cavalry
Replenishment is great, considering the climate, you most likely recover your army in not time to continue conquering, and you also have decent recruitment bases in case anything dies (what a pity-pity, hehe).
Now, go forth and destroy your enemies... while Tretch scurries away from you, yes-yes!
Source: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2972222833
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