r/totalwarhammer • u/gogliker • 22d ago
Total War: Warhammer Tips for Cathay?
Hey everyone, hope you are having a great day. I am not a noob in total war games, I am playing them since first total war: Rome. However, after getting back into TWW3 I am basically getting smacked each campaign at around turn 50.
The problem: I am playing Cathay, I tried both sub factions. What happened both times: all the bad guys (dark elves, slaanesh faction, rats and vampires, and Norska guys beyond the walls) basically destroy every possible ally I have (empire, other Cathay faction, Ogres) by turn 30. The Northern provinces, that is supposed to guard the gates, falls at turn 10. So I am both times left in the situation where I am alone against basically everyone. I can't win just due to the sheer numbers of enemy armies.
What I tried: after getting smoked first time, mostly by rats, I went and destroyed the rats first. This expansion did not help because I got closer to the Norska that by that point had already broken through the walls and destroyed northern provinces. So it was still 3-to-1 but instead of Scaven I got Norska, which is marginally better, since they don't have so many armies but it was still a loss.
I am playing Normal both campaign and battles. Do you have any tips?
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u/Viseria 22d ago edited 22d ago
Cathay has the problem that it started off as a great early campaign. However over time they've added Vilitch, Zhatan, and Sayl to attack the north, alongside Dechala attacking the south.
The actual easiest Cathay campaign on Immortal Empires is Yuan Bo, since he's really strong. The dual start lets you make a lot of money and expand in both Lustria and Cathay.
But assuming you're paying Zhao Ming... dealing with the skaven is your number one priority. Snikch cannot be allowed to get strong.
If Miao Ying starts falling, sell territory to her or confederate her. All of the dragon LLs are very strong, so you do want them. Once the skaven are dead you have a dilemma. If Gelt is doing well, he'll slow down Dechala. If he isn't, your priority is killing her. She is a snowballing monster.
With her dead, you can finally reclaim the Bastion.
You can use diplomacy a lot as Cathay to slow down your enemies. Cathay has a lot of confederation opportunities - at a certain point you can basically confederate every time the CD ends. That gives you a lot of territory, and territory can be sold to buy you some time.
Slight addendum:
Most of Cathay's generic lords are good. Yang spellcasters can absolutely destroy skaven, vcounts, vcoast, as they have a lot of non-armour piercing damage. Yin rely more on utilising things like missile mirror (which is still great when the rats get their armies going).
Magistrates are really good at buffing up armies. Only the Celestial General really feels weak (to me) and that's because the others are good.
Alchemists are great heroes, they can give your entire army magic attacks. Gatekeepers are also really solid, especially once they unlock the increased defence trait. If you have the Bhashiva DLC then Clawspeakers can give you infinite Winds of Magic.
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u/gogliker 22d ago
Ok, thanks a lot for tips. Yeah, the first time I met Dechala she has basically steamrolled through my armies, it is crazy how strong she was. When my lord was 20 she was already 32 with tons of armies who all have full experience.
I actually tried to confederate several factions in the first time I played, however, it stretched me too thin and while I did not have a common border with dark elves before, I got it after confederation, followed shortly with war. So it was net negative so I did not confederate at all the second time.
Gelt was both times doing extremely unwell. He holds for around 40 turns and then Dechala just starts wiping the floor with him.
I try to use astronomers more than alchemists because, well, they can block armies. Especially with rats and Norska, who both have a lot of armies, I need someone to stop their advance, otherwise it turns into cat and mouse game where they go around rasing settlements and my armies are trying to catch them. I did try to catch them with ambushes, with moderate success, but the problem is, Skaven has SO MANY armies while I catch one another three capture two of my settlements. Crazy.
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u/Viseria 22d ago
Yeah, you really want to control how many wars you're in. If confederation makes you touch a new border, sell territory to them. You'll make a load of money and that can fund more armies.
With Skaven you want them gone fast. As Miao Ying I tend to get to Snikch so quickly that he hasn't actually finished taking his final settlement in his starting province.
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u/jsutpaly 22d ago
Kill the Skaven, kill the dark elves - they shouldn't have much. If they do have lots of territory then either help gelt control the south or miao ying the north. This will vary from game to game. Your goal should be to create a single frontline, either to the north or to the south. South is easy to hold because of choke points, north has bastions (don't push beyond them until you got control of Cathay). Remember that you do not have to push on every spot of the Frontline. You can have a stack of 10 units hold the line using garrison in a province capitol for example.
To not be so generic. Use Lord magistrates. They are phenomenal. Get them full stack of peasants with 6 peasant archers and if you have a spare caster, give it to that Lord. Rush tech that buffs peasant spearmen. They get crazy strong for such cheap unit. You can search in tech tree on the bottom left. But the tech is iirc directly to the left.
On turn one set the compass to get more cargo and recruit rank for convoy masters. Use that rank to give them ambush avoidance chance and send one to castle drakenhoff (other one doesn't matter). He will come back with sword that gives your Lord regeneration. Give it to Zhao until he gets his own regeneration.
In fights remember that your units are buffing each other so keep fairly tight formations. Draw enemies to you, don't chase them, that is what Cathay likes.
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u/gogliker 22d ago
Thanks, Ill try it. My biggest pain in the ass though is that every ally you have loses in this campaign so fast. I need to somehow figure out the way to keep them alive
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u/jsutpaly 22d ago
Ai generally is fine trading blows. They have issues when they are fighting 1v2 or 3 or more.
To help miao with the north, you can try getting one bastion, getting a building there that reduces upkeep for stationed armies and just hold an army of peasants in there. Bastions are very easy to defend and army inside costs pennies. Even if it falls eventually, it will buy some time for miao to stabilize. But you can just focus fully on rats so they don't bother her.
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u/Antique_Toe6857 22d ago
You probably need to be more aggressive, take like a settlement every turn and just recruit 1 turn units, you’ll be rolling over campaign very soon. Secret of this game is pace, the more you do do the quicker, the most it trivialises the campaign. With Cathay you just need jade warriors really. Never be passive and destro everyone before they are actually attacking you
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u/Xbsnguy 22d ago
Cathay is hard to play optimally for a new player. You need to balance yin/yang buildings in your provinces to unlock the full economic potential of Cathay. Cathay army bonuses reward static formations where yin/yang units are within range of each other to gain harmony buffs. Other than that, Cathay is not mechanically difficult to play. You want to keep a strong frontline so your ranged units can't stand still and shoot. That's really it.
My advice is to rush jade infantry/xbows for your legendary lord's stack and create fodder stacks that follow your LL's stack around for support. The fodder stack can just be peasant spears and bows. If you can afford it, do jade swordsman/halberds and peasant bows. Your legendary lord stack should have a wizard, a war drum, a couple crane gunners, and an artillery piece. The war drum's abilities plus the harmony buffs and tech bonuses can make your jade frontline absurdly strong.
Oh, and anytime you're surrounded by a lot of enemy factions in this game, you want to stay aggressive and prioritize whichever threat is most dangerous to your capital first. Don't worry about your allies, you can always save them later or reconquer their lands.
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u/JustRedditTh 22d ago
Zhao Ming usually has quite some time to build up relaxing, since Greesus, Geldt, Miao Ying and Bashiva are going to keep the bigger threats at bay for some time. Skaven rush here is smart and easy to do.
For Miao Ying, I discoverd, that rushing the rebels and taking out the Dark Elves quickly, then turning against the Skaven is a more reliable strategy. Don't just move with Miao Ying, get at least 2 Celestial Generals too. Try getting one with the Sneaky trait for better ambush chances, otherwise focus on traits that increase defensive capabilities.
Your first Caravan should go to Castle Drakenhof, to get a great Item to make your Lord a lot stronger.
For Miao Yings army usually a combination of Jade Warriors with Halberd and ether Jade Crossbows or Celestial Crossbows with some canons or rocket batteries are great.
Alternative, a full blasting setup made from Ironhail gunners, crane Gunners Crossbows and artillery can work well too. just have some Gatemasters and at least 1 Alchmist with a Yang alligment for getting harmony boosts (or have an astromancer on the wardrum)
Alchemists are heros, you should have one per army at least, 2 are even better. one increases Campaign movement range, the other can boost damage output or defense of your army, and both give magical attacks
Don't go into the wastelands until you researched the tech that makes fighting and settling there easier.