Rating a Waywatcher Doomstack

[@gustavosanches3454]

Grimgor: sends in 3 armies, gets slaughtered. Grimgor 2 seconds after defeat: LETS DO IT AGAIN!

[@ElBandito]

Boyz gotta have fun.

[@Maybe-er8gl]

Ain't that basically the Orcs

[@Muck006]

"Let's see if we can make them chop down their own trees for ammunition after a decade of doing this"?

[@minerva9104]

Very lore accurate.

[@reuben7705]

I mean orcs aren't the brightest lot

[@benfields8044]

Forgot to mention watching waywatcher spam is a delight. Nothing more enjoyable then seeing those health bars disappear in a hail of arrows. : )

[@maevethefox5912]

Makes my Sister spam jealous

[@malekiththeeternityking5433]

Don't mind me just trying to survive the new Chaos update

[@varisugocsay1152]

Go for it boss - posted by the Khaine Gang

[@Witch_King]

Migrate to South America or retake Ulthuan.

[@malekiththeeternityking5433]

@@Witch_King What up myself? And yes taking Ulthuan has always been goal number 1

[@Hg-1-13]

I just realized that after the Chaos update Malekith is quite literally forced to run away southwards to mommy.

[@elmanhux]

feels Malus here~

[@linhuichi937]

What made the Waywatchers so good was not just the range buffs but the increased 1% missile damage buildings, without them you cant get 200 missile damage anymore.

[@carloscaballeromoreno4853]

Yeah, each unit could just delete an enemy unit in one volley

[@JunglersWithoutSmite]

That doesn't really matter as much since you can still reach over 100 damage. As far as I know, there is no infantry unit that has more than 100 hp per entity, and since you don't have explosive damage, you cant use that excess damage for anything. This means that it doesn't matter if your arrows deal 100 or 400 damage, at least when you're fighting infantry. Monsters aren't really an issue for archer spam in my experience.

[@carloscaballeromoreno4853]

@@JunglersWithoutSmite maybe, but seeing a giant drop from just one volley was quite amusing

[@rudelwolf1591]

to be honest, what hurts me way more is that they took the +2% income factionwide from the outpost. that got so ridiculous so fast... i had games where i built full economy, and around round 100 ish i had 12 armies in the field and still around 20k income per round. I never understood why people said wood elves are one of the poor factions, i never rolled in as much money as with the wood elves.

[@carloscaballeromoreno4853]

@@rudelwolf1591 probably because they are poor af early in the campaign. But yeah, as shitty as the outpost mechanic was, it gave some huge benefits late in the campaign.

[@BlueKookie888]

when you cheese the game, the game cheese you back (with wind of magic gamble)

[@lasse6435]

Seriously is there a bug again? Does Legend have a "Fuck you and your magic reserve!" mod? How is he so consistently unlucky with Ranald?

[@scottishblacklab]

@@lasse6435 yeah i think it's a bug because whenever i gamble it never goes up or down

[@wilhelmthegreat]

That wood elf at 9:10 just casually shooting their own general

[@joakimnordseth3290]

Bet he`s gonna say the treeman doomstack is better like 4-5 times

[@gammothguy297]

Yup

[@madzaisa]

Door Grimgor. Even with GS updates he's such a meme, like Morghur in Tariffs videos.

[@Quark214]

Tbf AI grimgor is probably the cheatiest in the game, if you leave him alone in the early-mid game, atleast in my games in like 4/5 campaigns he just blobs out to ridiculous levels

[@Quark214]

@Colin W ye, or the other way around clan mors confederating clan eshin, because of grimgor i've frequently seen thorgrim and queek ally. Even had one game as Ikit Claw where Queek became a fully fledged member of the ordertide because of thorgrim, he was even allied with the empire

[@kirevkizrepnav572]

@@Quark214 I also remember an ikit game like that, eventually dwarfs dowed me and pulled queek in (we had like +100 relations). I had to fight a rediciously buffed ordertide for a while untill they stopped being allied and queek instantly gave up and confederated. Skaven minds are truly a marvel to behold

[@H-rolf]

So I guess the strength of this stack is that you can build it very early. A turn 46 doomstack seems really strong, instead of the other "rate my doomstacks" that we usually see on turn 150!

[@rudelwolf1591]

that's true, especially in comparison to those hero doomstacks, where depending on your campaign it can take ages to build them, and most of the time you will have at max two doomstacks. At around turn 100, it's not hard to have 8 waywatcher doomstacks running around

[@rudelwolf1591]

which makes this kind of army even stronger in my opinion, because i don't need to worry about the doomstack being able to take out 4 armies, because i can throw at least 2 of them at any problem there is :D

[@sydorovich2532]

Drycha can spam treemen at the same turns.

[@sympunny8636]

i guess the thing is, since it's the woodelves it automatically gets compared to the treeman doomstack which is slightly slower but far more consistent, since it doesn't rely on ammo. If you wanted to compare it to other races, then the sisters of avelorn doomstack comes to mind, who are actually cheaper with far better melee stats if their ammo does run out.

[@MrBoom6009]

Thing is you can easily make a hawkrider stack on like turn 30.

[@nicolass-c7247]

for a turn 45 doomstack, it's pretty impressive i think

[@MarieAvora]

The good thing about this stack is that it's reaaaaaally easy to get, wood elves can get tier 4 quite early and there are defensive buildings that give them all sorts of bonuses in defense, including extra ammo capacity, makes em stupid good early on

[@cHaMp630]

The real problem is that they suck ass in sieges. As someone who conquested the map twice as wood elves you're generally going to want treeman spam as your main attacking force. Recruiting waywatchers is only something you do over an end turn with 30 global recruit slots to fight off flanking armies trying to take your outposts.

[@ablet85]

@@cHaMp630 I’ve been playing them on current campaign and find them really effective at clearing walls and capitals. Only issue I’ve had is running 16WW and 3x25% ammo it may take 2 battles to clear them all because you run out of ammo

[@darkrite9000]

@@cHaMp630 I mean, the only reason waywatchers aren't as good in sieges is because wood elves lack artillery, so you'd need to tank the towers with your lord and heroes. Whereas with treeman you just charge the gate and heal to account for damage taken, use dwellers below to get tons of kills and call it a day. If wood elves had artillery to take out the towers than it wouldn't be much different in terms of effectiveness for sieges. In fact it'd be about the same as using a sisters of avelorn doomstack at that point. Though sisters have better melee stats to account for being worse at range than waywatchers, and then there's the fact they'd have lore of light to tie down anyone they need to. Though suppose having a waystalker would be similar to a basic net, but I'd never use more than one waystalker since they don't give extra range anymore. Quick edit, though suppose there's little point in wondering what if's. Cause wood elves do have somethings that'd be equivalent to artillery in the lore, namely in the fact they have some trees with magic bows, but since those aren't in the game it's a moot point.

[@mishmashmarsh9499]

"Quickly" at 7:45 triggered my PTSD from the Isabella video. Quickly, swiftly, quickly, (Screaming inside)

[@loanstowalruses]

I think the 2x waystalkers is so you can have their aura on covering the entire army (half from each), and they can serve as frontline for incoming enemies in a pinch.

[@stryfegamingonline7583]

That's exactly what it's for. And you can snipe artillery or enemy heroes from time to time.

[@emilm8603]

I was thinking about that as well. The extra damage sure help them a lot, sort of makes up for having ammo issues. I usually only bring 1 myself though, and I often remove them once all the armies are lvl9 or I have finished Oreons camp ritual, and just move them to a fresh army or use them as campaign agents. I don't really like going pure waywatchers though.

[@huyo5211]

Wait, this map is just Agincourt

[@Wlerin7]

7:12 "still looks like a lot of troops there and we are running low on ammo" *lets them fire another full volley at a dead unit* I know you were intentionally doing low micro in this battle, but Waywatchers have so much damage output that you really need to split their shots up among multiple enemy units instead of all firing at one, then another, then another.

[@Zayl1016]

I did notice the waystalkers were buffed in this army and have 72 melee attack, which could be the answer to running out of ammo. Ideally, that kinda melee attack is enough to clean up any kinda enemies remaining, while your insane missile strength can be used to delete all high value units.

[@aidansalt7862]

I also noticed that and also thought that but then when they actually go into melee as we saw they take alot of damage and it was only against 2 1/2 stacks. I love the wood elves and I love just shooting hails of arrows so I was hoping this would be great but it runs out of steam and then you are left penis in hand. Its a good army and is fun to use but its not "can force march into skaven territory blindly" type doomstack.

[@Zayl1016]

@@aidansalt7862 I agree with the, "can't walk into enemy territory blindly" but for different reasons. It was getting a ton of buffs from forest battles from characters, most of which would be gone when it leaves a forest. IMO this would make it great at defending woods. Also Legend himself noted it's not that optimized. With research and replacing some heroes with different ones, it could have had the ammo to chew threw another stack or two.

[@Grails_Knight]

@@aidansalt7862 anyways, woodelves can still ambush with 10% Movement Speed and have a lower detection chance, so theyre pretty save in skaven territory, while High Elves aren't really.

[@johnmcmanus2447]

"Need to be efficient with ammo, I'll just turn on fire at will." Wait, what? Not hating, just made me laugh

[@humphreybumblecuck5151]

I know this is obvious, but too much top down control can introduce inefficiencies where just letting your units on the front line pick their own targets can be more efficient. This applies to most areas of life. Total control can be stifling! Just let do.

[@fireblade2681]

the best way to use waywatcher stack is with gladeriders with hagbane tips. Hide the waywatchers, kill their cav with your hagbanes then kite with the hagbanes and follow behind them with your waywatchers staying far enough away that they dont get discovered and shoot at their backs. Easy way to win a battle with 0 casualties.

[@IAmebAdger]

Maybe the ratings should include the time you can get them online. Like the one shown in this video comes online far quicker than the treemen stack and it's cheaper. You can prolly just get a couple of these waywatcher stacks with not much care or leveling put into it and do what you need to do until you feel comfortable going for treemen.

[@Muck006]

The efficiency of Wood Elf doomstacks hinges A LOT on the amount of Amber you have been able to spend, because the "middle upgrades" make both elves/archers and treemen far more efficient. This is probably the big weakness of Wood Elves ... because other races might have a building they need to build, but that is easily manageable.

[@jdmac157]

Before the wood elves got nerfed, waywatcher doomstack was my favourite.

[@changliu7346]

Yeah, it’s fun to see then vanguard and snipe artys although it’s never been that strong of a doom stack.

[@sapphire01001]

Same it was the most fun doomstack but sadly CA decided that you were not supposed to have fun as the Wood elves

[@Quark214]

I totally feel you, waywatcher doomstack,sisters of avelorn and shades are the only doomstacks i ever use, although single entities doomstacks like shaggoths,necrofex,mammoths and steggadons are powerful, i just find them pretty boring

[@Grails_Knight]

Its still great. You just dont use them as standing armies, you use them es emergency stacks to pump out everywhere at your borders where enemies arise. You can recruit 2 of those stacks in one turn if you spam the +1 Global recruitment skill in the Spellweaver's blue line (together with knowledgeables). The Army is still very, very good. Its just not as stupidly OP as 16 Treemen sitting in a Forest and having a pickning with an Elder Treeman, two Spellweavers and two branchraithes wich with their permanent greater Arcane Conduits regenerate Magit at Lightning speed while everything around them dies a horrible Death. But well... thats one top-knotch doomstack. This one is just an average Doomstack, but still a doomstack that can kill almost every army (if used correctly).

[@quickdraw6893]

IDK what's with people thinking wood elves got nerfed. You can't stack +1% modifiers into oblivion, sure, but when you have like 60 outposts with that, I doubt you have much left to do in the campaign. Their armies are stronger than ever during the part of the game where you're actually at risk of losing.

[@colbunkmust]

Having two glade captains allows you to stack both Loec defense buffs simultaneously, assuming you choose not to upgrade one of them to the second level. Not that useful with an archer build though.

[@metehantasbas5535]

I'm sitting in my room staring at the KZbin mainpage waiting for Legend to upload something to pull me out of my misery.

[@Nisenziart]

"And glade captains dont have a lot of dmg output.." Me looking at my glade captain on a stag with shitton of health tanking whole armies like a treeman , with over 1000+ weapon and missile strenght and a health potion and multiple abilities and stats from items. Give her one unit of sisters of thorn and they wreak havoc like crazy.

[@IAmebAdger]

The Waystalkers also have a damage buff aura for ranged units, but yeah I would replace them with more waywatchers, or put in some sisters of thorn to cast slow on the enemy.

[@Hencho06]

Yo Legends, its 11:00pm my time in SA but just wanted to say that you are the best and most underrated KZbinr/streamer on the platform. Thanks for the amazing vids and I hope your channel continues to thrive.

[@Kilen_BE]

There is a decent way to minimise the lost of arrows for waywatchers: If you have 17or18 of them in one army, you put them in 3 groups of 6, on one single line (like here), but when the enemy units reach 90% of hp pool gone, u stop free open fire for the 2 groups on each flank of your line. And take the middle one only to finish these units nearly dead, while giving new fresh targets to the 2 groups on the flanks, it reduces the waste of arrows consistently. More micromanagement ofc, wich is unusual with archers based army, but it’s necessary vs 3stacks (or you loose in melee after lose all ammos). But if u do that, u can take 3 armies with one of waywatchers, using all arrows. 4 armies although, that’s always a problem... always not enough ammos in that case.

[@xolotlaxolotl8934]

the true wood elves doomstack is the Hawk Riders doomstack now

[@IAmebAdger]

@@bogdanleshenko7149 Enemy never recruits stegadon doomstack, so that's a bad example. I'm trying to think of an AI stack that actually beats Hawk Rider doomstack... idk, I think Hawk Rider doomstack is actually pretty good in single player.

[@shake-it4206]

Wood Elf archers are still super good, even low tier archers would perform really well with this setup of heroes.

[@Kamidon74]

I love this new doomstack series of videos, this is really cool

[@ArnoVdVelde]

They were so good when you could up their damage. I think this could do a lot better with some micro management, just one volley into each unit is enough. But massive archer spam is cool though.

[@AshenVictor]

AFAICT the minimum reload time for anything is 4-4.5 seconds (not 2 as the unit card claims).

[@JaketheflyingSnake]

After I noticed at a Questbattle that my glade guard actually shot as stated in the card every 2 seconds i did some testing in the laboratory. Laboratory customisation + white magic spell got my archers to 1.6 sec reloadtime. Result for Wood Elves: Tier 1 and 2 missile Infantry didn't care about any animation, they shot every 1.6 sec. Tier 3 (waywatchers) at least took some time to show an animation and shoot about every 3 seconds.

[@panzerspahwagen527]

The waystalkers are for the missile damage area buff

[@Berbasecks]

yes but then 1 should have +5% and the other +10% so they stack?

[@cHaMp630]

@@Berbasecks Aoe buffs afaik don't usually stack.

[@John-if9ig]

@@cHaMp630 The thing with that is even if they don't stack the aura ranges will mean that you cant actually cover all of your waywatchers with just one so you would have to set up the waywatchers in a UU pattern with the waystalkers and glade captains near the top of the U

[@cristianfatu2088]

those 4 heroes are for tanking up the entire army and the life wizard to heal them and will take a few volleys to wipe out everyone in the blob pretty much. Just like bretonnia and with archers and lord/paladins.

[@MalkavDraconic]

Waywatcher doom stack appears to need more management. Shoot big things. Stab goblins. Use life to repair and shield of thorns when stabbing. The gladelords/waystalkers are character/beast removal with arrows of kurnous.

[@Dead_Fish0]

*Slating* a Waywatcher Doomstack

[@mauroferrari5518]

I managed to get Waywatchers to... I don't remember, either 34 or 37 ammunition. It was a combination of level 7, lord skills, and a technology that requires amber.

[@lewishand3531]

I understand why CA removed the Talons of Kurnos trait for Waystalkers but I really think that in exchange they should have given Waystalkers the same ability that Skaven Warlock engineers have that gives all units an extra 10% range. That way both Waystalkers and Waywatchers would be viable again.

[@alex_zetsu]

It's particularly stupid since 1, Wood Elves don't have anything else to counterfire on artillery (Vampire Counts don't either, but a summon on the artillery and it's gone), 2 Wood Elves were the only faction to get weaker with their update, and 3 Master Engineer still works, meaning the nerf of Talons of Kurnos was not a range stacking thing they were going after, it was just the Wood Elves!

[@Cross_111]

@@alex_zetsu truth be told they got more lore friendly now And truth be told if you are nor playing on legendary difficulty its not much of a deal And lets be honest; expanding was never nice with wood elves; the outposts were a real pain to defend... Prefer them as they are now (still waystalkers could use buffs)

[@Tachii31]

Trying to understand the double Waystalkers, could it be to stack Eye of Kurnous and Sight Beyond Sight?

[@TheYannir]

It doesn't work with Waywatchers since those only buff Base Missile damage, not the AP Missile damage that Waywatchers primarily do. So when you get rid of your initial Glade Guard stack, it's also time to make your Waystalkers into agents since they don't really perform a viable role on the battlefield anymore.

[@Tachii31]

@@TheYannir Oh, thanks. I didn't realise that's how that worked.

[@BobMcBobJr]

Case for the life wizard: 1)You can heal your heroes, which is important against fast armies. 2)Evil roots can kill enemy infantry to save ammo for more dangerous things. 3)The trade is a single unit of waywatchers which I think is less powerful I do think the waystalkers were un-useful though

[@MechaMan3451]

I’m new to the game and have been playing the Greenskins a lot because, y’know, Orc Boyz. I’ve been specifically playing Grimgor on Mortal Empires, and that usually meant I was facing off against Dwarves and other Greenskins. Orion decided to start taking shots at me and declared war, so I went in with 3 full stacks and he almost wiped me at Ye Olde Tree. That was after I reset the first time, because the first time he actually wiped me completely. After doing some research, I have learned that the Greenskins are currently sad boyz because the meta is range spam and magic. I also play on normal, so it makes it easier for me. Lord knows, every strategy game I play above normal is like playing with a bullet wound in the thigh. I hate it.

[@trsasddtasdsaasd9995]

waywatchers kill way faster than treeman doomstack though. It saves you a lot of real life time

[@Owlr4ider]

To be fair Waywatcher doomstacks should be compared with other ranged doomstacks like Shades, Sisters of Avelorn, etc, as they're all basically limited by their ammunition more than anything else in terms of damage output and aren't too tanky. Archer based doomstacks aren't actual doomstacks like various hero spams or monster spams(Mammoths, Necrofex, Treemen, Stegadons, etc). They're also typically much cheaper and easier to get and don't require specific items/trait to be viable.

[@elbeillustration762]

The Waystalkers are there for sight beyond sight, no?

[@txpolitix]

You wasted so much ammo shooting shattered units in the beginning.

[@PlanetarPL]

Playing currently Vampire Counts campaign. Turn 200+ so I have all Imperium of Man and Dwarfs on East and Britonnia under my command and defeated Chaos invasion. Now having first fight with Wood Elves Lord Phoenix near Middenheim who I spared. I declared war and was closing to her only city. And she sailed out launched attack on me. I'm like: Wow she is brave. She could wait in her forest city but ok. I fight with my middle strenght army lead by Strigoi on Terrorgeist, not my main Mannfred. So I had 1 Wight, 1 Vampire, 1 Necro, 3 Grave Guards, 4 Skellies Spears, 1 Vargulf, 7 Black Knights and 1 Mortis Engine. Composition of Wood Elves army: Leader Phoenix on Eagle, 4 Wildwood Rangers (glaives), 5 Wardancers, 4 Glade Guard (Hagbane Tips) , 4 Sisters of the Thorn, 2 Tree Kins. At start of battle I manage to force them to lost 90% of their arrows by luring them to shot air. I think: Ok now it's gonna by easier. Clash finally happen. Boom! They fight like hell. Lots of wardancers even when I charge them from behind with Black Knights they manage to survive and fight to the end. I fight hard focusing on micromanaging, cyclic charges with black knights & trying hard to avoid those dudes with big glaives running after me all the time lol. 2 treekins units barely took any losses until the very end of fight. Vampire on Nightmare get surrounded and died. I barely survived. Pyrric Victory :D From around 1000 units down to 200. Losses: 1 Vampire, 2 Skellies, 2 Black Knights. I'm like wtf! If they land, I don't know, only 30% of arrows earlier I would be ded. How to counter them with VC? I'm now very afrad to attack Orion and his forrest mates.

[@Nikalin]

2:37 What regen is Legend talking about here, when the mages is hidden in the trees?

[@albericdecarrere8436]

Branchwraiths and Spellsingers regenerates Winds of Magic when in a forest (it's called blessing of whatever on the unit card). So it's always best to fight in the forest witht them or at least keep them in trees if you can, it's like a free greater arcane conduit

[@Nikalin]

@@albericdecarrere8436 Oh, didn't know that one, thanks!

[@Sebastien_Senet-Larson]

I read the title as "RAT-ing" instead of "ray-ting". I expecting way too much skaven shenanigans from this channel...

[@blender7]

it took me multiple videos before I realized he wasn't RAT-ing. I started watching when he was doing a couple skaven videos together.

[@Panos_of_Rivia]

Great job on the daily uploads!

[@R3GARnator]

This same army with an actual leveled wizard would be pretty epic.

[@proxyx3557]

I also put some dragons in it, just to be prepared for when i ran out of ammo and still need to fight.

[@sablesword6239]

Those Glade Captains need to be put on Great Stags. Not only does it make them extremely fast, it also adds a big chunk of physical resistance and some really good animations. They can tank very well and dish out a solid amount of damage in melee. I also don't like the inclusion of the glade lord. I get that the dragon is providing siege attacker, but a spellweaver would be better for literally everything else.

[@IAmebAdger]

If you need melee fighters, sure, but I find the eagle mounted glade captain compliments this army more. Waywatcher armies don't need a melee line, as they can skirmish and shoot really fast. They can potentially make use out of fast flying heroes that can do hit and runs on artillery pieces though.

[@Your_Paramour]

I don't think the dragon lord is worthwhile either, I think you're better off using branchwraiths on the campaign map to damage walls. Once you get a couple branchwraiths decently leveled you can level a settlements walls down to 0% in 2-3 turns which is extremely useful if you're spamming waywatchers since it completely destroys the wall towers in the siege battle.

[@IAmebAdger]

@@Your_Paramour I do like the dragonlord for that one office that gives 10% map movement though, gotta go fast!

[@sablesword6239]

@@IAmebAdger For starters, he sure needed some melee fighters by the end of this, didn't he? Skirmishing with Waywatchers will have major problems if the enemy brought a bunch of mobility. Sure, the Waywatchers will wreck most of them on the charge, but anything that gets through will do a great deal of damage, especially when all the other Waywatchers decide to "help out" by sending a hail of arrows at the unit(s) caught in melee. I much prefer to simply intercept any threats like that with a mobile and tough hero. At the same time, a Captain on a Stag is still fast enough to flank and go after artillery if you need them to, assuming you don't do it with a caster on a Eagle who should at least be able to handle an artillery crew. Stag Captains are also good in sieges to send through the gates and blob the enemy up for spells. They aren't Treemen, but they're more than durable enough to handle it. I honestly think that a good part of Legend's dismissiveness of Glade Captains as fighters in this video is because he only ever uses them on eagles....

[@IAmebAdger]

@@sablesword6239 He didn't play optimally, as her admits, he wouldn't have needed melee if he did. Point well taken about cavalry charges, the stag does do better against those. The Eagle does better against flying unit charges though XD. I find having multiple flying heros is nice as it allows me to send at multiple artillery units at once, but eh, point taken that stags can snipe artillery as well, it's just kind of annoying to micro them around for that. Sieges in this game are a joke, but if we're talking about them, I could mention the eagle is better for slow-cheese sieges as it allows you to cheese wall units and enemy artillery, as well as deal with flying units which the stag can't get at. But yes, the stag is better for a crash-the-gate style of siege.

[@SirMcAwesome]

9:06 WTF.... did that glade captain just nuke his own commander? LMAO!

[@alex_zetsu]

Flock of doom can do over 3,000 AP damage in one cast if done right. The problem is that there is a limit of how much damage you can do per unit per cast. I once got that amount of damage by casting on 7 units and that battle I can say my damsel did much better than she would have if she was a second Life Damsel, although in every other battle of that campaign a second Life Damsel or even a cavalry unit would have done better.

[@Jake-oz5mg]

really liking these 'rate my doomstack' videos

[@dmytro.sereda]

I think one of the points, which was missed is the 72 melee attack, which will help a lot even on legendary against most of the enemy melee troops after all ammo is gone.

[@dmytro.sereda]

@@bogdanleshenko7149 For sure, but you lure cavalry/monsters first, and then, when all or almost all high value units are killed in ranged - you can finish enemy stack in meele (for example in orcs army you killed giants/arachnarock spiders/boar riders/goblin riders then black orcs, and after quiver is empty - kill goblins/big uns/orc boys in meele).

[@shorewall]

I think the key to archer armies is to be the attacker and use Lightning Strike, like with the Sisters Doomstack. The problem is that the Wood Elves seem to be a more defensive faction now, sticking to their forests and taking out intruders. You should still try to Lightning Strike enemies and be the attacker, but defending the forests doesn't seem to play to the strengths of a ranged army.

[@IAmebAdger]

The best defense is till offense, in this case anyways ;)

[@antcig]

Ambush is better than lightning strike. WE get a blue skill to improve their ambush chance.

[@Grails_Knight]

If Someone gets into your Forest, you already did something wrong. No one should ever enter your Forest. To ensure that, you secure the Borders of your Forest until theres no threat to the Forest in sight. Also there are lots of Forests to clean, and also some jusicy settlements (Estalia/Skavenblight/Tilea/Sartosa is 6 Harbors plus an extra +30% Tax rate for Skavenblight, Miragliano and Sartosa for example), there is no time for sitting in the Forests with our warriors. We need to go out and save the oak of Ages until no Forest of the World is in Danger.

[@IAmebAdger]

@@Grails_Knight Tbh, it depends. I let them into my forest on purpose sometimes because I get so many advantages there. My other armies can go off to do something else while the enemy makes a futile assault on my home turf.

[@Zefar77]

I think using auto attack when it's 3 armies might be a bit bad. Probably better to try and make them shoot once or twice to destroy the unit so that it flees.

[@sokar_rostau]

I think you sometimes forget that Lords and Heroes can have auras that buff certain troops. You certainly did it with the Hawk Riders stack, sending the Twins off by themselves and depriving the Hawks of a missile damage buff. You've done the same thing here with the Waystalkers. Eye of Kurnous/Sight Beyond Sight are auras that give a missile damage bonus. With a radius of only 30(?) metres, there were two in the army because one of them is simply not enough to buff that many Waywatchers (I doubt that two is enough for full coverage either). To add insult to injury, you placed them so far ahead of the army that the auras would have had almost no effect at all. Would a 15%(?) damage boost be the difference between an awesome doomstack and a shitty one? Probably not. It probably would have meant running out of ammo a bit later, though.

[@kaakkulandia]

@LegendofTotalWar Would you be interested in also including in the evaluation the price and availability of the doomstacks. I feel like it could be an interesting take on this too, especially if you consider possible early-/midgame doomstacks.

[@kaakkulandia]

Does "doomstack" have such unflexible meaning? I've always thought it as just "a very strong army agains anything the enemy can throw at you". And I mean, earlygame doomstack wouldn't need to defeat a horde of griffon riders if it's in the early game. Although I quess early game doomstacks don't really have the same function as normal doomstacks as you always are trying to get to the midgame and upgrading your units. And it's not like there would be much diversity there. Archers only I quess.

[@alex_zetsu]

@@kaakkulandia No, I really think doomstack does have a narrow definition, at least the way Legend uses it. He says anything needs to be above a 7 to count as a doomstack. He's also never called early game armies doomstacks. The way he uses it, it pretty much needs to win 3 against full stacks with at least one of them being a good army (not like Skaven slaves) to count. This is the only time I've seen him call an army a doomstack that beat only 2 full stacks, and maybe that's because he speculated a better leveled Life Wizard could help the battle. He's also never called a diverse army a doomstack no matter how much he liked it. It's easy to see why. When 15 or more of your units are the same, you don't need to worry each one is doing the right thing. I've also never seen anyone on steam call an army a doomstack if it doesn't meet all those conditions. For example, an army with 1 Lord, 2 Heros, and 17 Knights Errant was never called a doomstack, but knight spam or if they were specific, Knights Errants spam.

[@redelephantsdotnl]

This works, because Grimgor and Blorcs rely on armor to protect themselves, which is why Grimgor and Blorcs have no real say in the lategame. Wurrzag and his SOrcs would still loose to this, but you'd run out of ammo doing it. Put Skarsnik in here with Skulkers/Fanatics andit's over. With 200 models, widely spread, stalk and shields - waywatchers have nothing on them. Even regular gobbos will work better than Blorcs.

[@Grails_Knight]

I think Waywatchers is a 7/10 Doomstack and a 10/10 Crapstack. If used correctly, you would almost never fight a Battle against Multiple Armies. You just always ambush (with 10% of movement range) or deny reinforcements or lightning strike. Just the same as with sisters. Also you can put out a waywatcher Spam anywhere on the Map at any time in one turn with the techtree. Its also way cheaper than a Treeman Stack. Also the Ammo Bonus from Glade Captains didnt take effect in this battle, as the Terrain was "Worldroots" in the pre battle panel and it needs to be forest there for the Bonus to take effect. (correct me if i'm wrong there, but that how I heared it works) Magic isnt as good in this as in Treestacks, as you dont have Branchwraithes (and a caster General) to generate magic, so a caster is good, doesnt really matter wich one (shadow or life). One Glade Captain is actually enough, But I think 2 Waystalkers is good. They have Hawkish precision in an Aura around them from the Start and they get sight beyond sight and two prey of Anath rema, theyre definitely okay. Not Neccessary though (wich makes the Stack even better as an emergency Army - it benefits from heroes, but it actually doesnt need them). I totally agree that nothing really compares to treestacks - i have seen those Trees do amazing things - but you dont always have 3 Turns to recruit one, and then its great to have the Stalkers. PS: Also I Disagree on this beeing an overly easy battle, as the waywatchers were hit at their weakness: 3 armies of Orks to hurl arrows at. The Old Waywatcher Spam would not have survived that most likely, because it wouldnt have enough Ammo.This one had.

[@redtsun67]

Yeah okay but who would win 14 waywatchers in a doomstack or 1 lord running around in a circle?

[@SGProductions87]

Awakening of the Wood is a cheap spell that slows enemies down and can slow multiple enemies at once whereas Melkoth's is a single target spell. That being said, Shadows does give you 12% extra speed with every cast.

[@FirstTruth]

I use a hagbane tip stack with a couple of hawk rider units and a life mage or Ariel. Haven’t had anything come close to killing it since Ariel and the sisters can tank as well for the archers and if I remember the hagbane tips slow enemies.

[@IAmebAdger]

Hagbanes are good, but eventually Starfire shaft glade guards are better since AI upgrades to armoured unit armies.

[@thomascreak2928]

I ran my whole campaign with waywatcher spam, I did put 3 to 5 hawks in to deal with cavalry/runners, ammo was a problem but I'd just retreat after I was empty no magic or heroes needed

[@SHH-fc4lt]

Wood elves need an old outpost...

[@IIrishWarrior]

couldnt agree more, if you came up against rockets aswell in a fast moving enemy you would struggle

[@arthanor9631]

Waystalkers are for the aura for missile damage too, no? While they do not provide as much as the captains (mobility is just SO good), they do contribute a bit. This looks like an army for lightning striking. 1v1, you just melt whatever the enemy throws at you. Grimgor's army evaporated. Imagine if that's all there was. But lightning strike is OP AF, essentially built as a counter to Legendary AI army spam. I prefer playing without it (mod removes it) and at very hard.

[@thijsv948]

Wouldn't guard mode make for still a low micro setup without wasting so much ammo on shattered units? Particularly, the last few creatures in a unit cost a disproportionate amount of ammo, as they're harder to hit while providing no value in taking them out. Or even just staggering your units so they dont target the same unit with almost all of them at the same time, again leading to waste cause of overkilling. Cause I feel like while the ammo prob wouldn't last for a third army, a large amount was wasted from not using some more basic management.

[@sevenayashinedown1283]

In this situation I would have swapped the waystalkers for two more glade captains. 100% more ammo on 15 waywatchers is better than 50 more ammo on 17. I think 4 captains and a shadows spell lord and rolling everywhere in tree stance is pretty tough for anything to get to short.

[@qaramba]

Heyo everyone, does Kinband Captain (+25% Ammunition in forest) realy stacks ?

[@JustSome462]

Yes

[@okebul5474]

as i know, stacks every modifier, that does NOT give a special effect. For an example: "+10% range to units in lord`s army" - stacks, "unlocks effect (effect_name) which provides +10% range" does NOT stack

[@dennoplit]

Boosts stack passive abilieties no

[@over9000lord]

This stack lacks a couple of those new branchwraiths who have bound net of amyntok thanks to their trait.

[@over9000lord]

@@bogdanleshenko7149 I am pretty sure I had some in my sisters of twilight campaign. Just regular, not malevolent branchwraiths, with trait like befuddlement of mischiefs or something like that. It gives bonus chance to reduce army movement and bound net of amyntok like spell

[@Random_Guardsman]

Waywatchers also had their accuracy nerfed in the last patch.

[@Random_Guardsman]

@@bogdanleshenko7149 Its in the patch notes :)

[@GhostOfBuscemi]

This would work if say the wood elves had ammo regen in forest battles but anything more then taking out single stacks (god forbid another doomstack steps to you) seems heavily taxing in terms of micro which is kind of not the point of a doomstack imo

[@eldenwarden9673]

So this stack isn't very optimized, I wouldn't have 2 waystalkers and glade guard if the buffs don't stack. I did want to try this with Swiftshiver Shards or whatever.

[@eldenwarden9673]

Glade captains*

[@Shishakind86]

Doomstacks that consist of ranged units are always somewhat risky because of potential ammo problems and unfavorable maps.

[@mookt3873]

you will encounter doomstacks like shaggoth spams if you almost exclusively play head to head campaigns with a friend like i do. so i would actually like to know what the counters are to some of these doomstacks too, it always frustrates me when legend says you'll never have to fight a doomstack, because i regularly have to

[@a.hollins8691]

a StAuNcH LiNe oF tReEs would have helped

[@beagle4932]

9:04 Saulus did an oopsie

[@Anand70707]

I think it would be better on the Sisters' army, because they give some extra ammo as well.

[@catsndogs98]

I hope some one tried a a handgunnery zombie mob doom stack

[@ggleplussuxx4787]

Ah, that one map

[@josedasilva6885]

76 melee attack waywatchers. If run out of ammo close to the end you can still win. Not good, but possible.

[@Siddhartha02]

I think you probably could have won this with no deaths with a bit of practice and if you had just been better with conserving ammo and targeting. There was a bunch of units the waywatchers killed down to the last man, probably wasting mora than half of their ammo. I feel this video wasn't very representative of this army's strength.

[@stormysurge9083]

5:15

[@crim1188]

@@stormysurge9083 sure the ease of use is important too but when he just lets them waste their ammo... it's not like that requires crazy amounts of micro

[@TheIMP2010]

@@crim1188 Right? Like, just push F my guy. Watching people click hotkeys tilts me something fierce.

[@IAmebAdger]

I think he was trying to test whether this stack was good enough to beat them if you just stood your waywatchers there and put your hands behind your head XD

[@darklordoffiction]

So this is what kerillian did after vermintide 2.

[@easytanksgaming3238]

Before update waywatchers had supposed to have over 50-60 damage from each arrow (the arrow, not the overall missile damage in stats), which guarantee u, that they will obliterate literally EVERY infantry in a game with 2 volleys. Only exception is a scavenslaves, they just have too many models, but anyway they run away in fear after first arrows. Just take about 50 settlements and build +1% missile damage building ;) U can deploy 19 waywatchers face to face to the enemy, press "to battle" button and shred the enemy army in a 20-30 seconds without touching entire keyboard and mouse. That was pretty funny))

[@blurghthebuilder8793]

I don't know if you've seen it already but theres a bug where the cellular instability explosion keeps happening in the same spot even after the unit has moved away

[@eon12321]

imho @Legend ofTotalWar didnt even bother to utilise the Waystalkers aura Sight Beyond Sight, which led to damage decrease, thus more ammo usage. The aura is quite short range (which, for those who dont know) you can light up if you hover over the ability in the left panel) so the 14 WayWatchers wont all fit, but 7WayWatcher units can fit in there in a Ü shape without blocking their own LoS, which might have countered the overkill effect aswell because the army has layers. Army would look like ÜÜ , with the dots being Waystalker/GladeCaptain and being more inside the U. I think the Dragon was there to sweep up units that came too close, and the healer to heal the dragon. Love your content though @LegendofTotalWar, especially how your character developed to be less bitchy, and more understanding of newby perspectives. Cheers!

[@alexeyalexandrov7583]

I found Bladesingers pretty doomstack'able as WE. They are super strong (beat golden chevron Black Orcs on VH), can reach 50% physical resist and fast. They also get stalk and vanguard deployment from one of offices.

[@IAmebAdger]

Idk if I would even use that office. If I were to doomstack bladesingers, I would probably prefer the 10% weapon dmg buff to army office instead of the james bond bladesingers office (glamourweaver or w/e it was called).

[@astertis2042]

They are also getting extra melee attack from one of the followers which stacks, so it can easily put them at extra 15-20 MA just from that. Definitely an underrated unit

[@alexeyalexandrov7583]

@@IAmebAdger Stalk allows them to approach unprotected walls. Vanguard is crucial when dealing with artillery-heavy factions - so you can deploy troops close to their arty and not let it shoot. I don't think 10%WS is worth as much as stalk and vanguard

[@IAmebAdger]

@@alexeyalexandrov7583 True I guess. I never doomstack melee infantry, so I hadn't considered artillery as a problem, since I usually take those out with the flying part of my balanced army. But if I were to doomstack melee infantry I can see how stalk and vanguard becomes more valuable.

[@AkhilMulpuru]

Genuine question, to Legend or anyone, why were the wood elves nerfed? I have no knowledge of CA but I personally believe they don't make these changes lightly. They've clearly thought through it and tested it out and I trust them but am kinda confused....

[@Mikle_Silver]

I wonder, if it's good to go 50\50 with waywatchers and treeman? Like when there are no ammo, treeman will do the rest of work. OR it would lot less efficient?

[@Gilmaru]

How did he get them to 247 range?

[@TristanTerlouw.]

I love RYD video's, it's really helpful

[@hagiaiit]

ive done a simelar army but u kinda need 2 high lvl casters to make it work good imo and then utelise them to the fullest before u actually use your waywatchers

[@fil2fer1150]

I feel like the wood elves need a skill that gives them a little bit of ammo back. It feels unfair that some races can spam range almost indefinitely but not the WE

[@John-if9ig]

@@bogdanleshenko7149 I think Eltharion can as well with his unending volley but im not sure if its him i know there is a HE lord that can do it

[@sentro5382]

what lords is the talon of kurnous trait available for? I've spent 30 turns recruiting and disbanding female and male glade lords for talsyn/wood elves and have only been able to find it on spellsingers... am I doing something wrong?

[@Tenhys]

I don't think Legend understood that the agents weren't supposed to stay behind but rather at the front, baiting and stalling the ennemy units while the lore of life caster was keeping them in fighting shape and the waywatchers could easily slaughter the concentrated mass of infantry under a constant rain of arrows. (That's usually how i play my waywatchers anyway...) So seeing him keeping the agents behind instead of putting them at the front... kind of irritates me.

[@thecentralscrutinizerr]

I gave up playing the Sisters of Twilight DLC because I can't find the Beastmen Herdstones and can't colonize the forest.

[@wies9395]

do buffs like +30% ammunition stack? so can I use multiple heroes with traits that enhance missile damage/ammunition/etc?

[@alexeyalexandrov7583]

Traits stack, aura's don't. So ammo increase stacks, damage increase from Waystalker's aura doesn't

[@wies9395]

@@alexeyalexandrov7583 does this apply to all races?

[@alexeyalexandrov7583]

@@wies9395 Yes. For example ammo and damage from Skaven or Dwarwen engineers stack but range doesn't

[@wies9395]

@@alexeyalexandrov7583 thanks a lot for taking your time and answering my question!

[@CromulentEmbiggening]

How do you still get that massive 240 range with Waywatchers? I thought the Talon of Kurnous applies to the whole army only if it's a Lord now. So how can you still get that range, because I'd like to try it

[@alexeyalexandrov7583]

It's Talon of Kurnous lord + red skill tree

[@JaketheflyingSnake]

There must be something else. He has currently +30% range. Lord trait gives +15%, red line gives +10% but only to units of rank 7 and higher (not applied, as you can see how legendary is comparing units above and unter rank 7 and both have the same range). Question is, where is he getting the additional 15% from?