Faction Observations: Who's the strongest? Who's the best?

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Inuyasha
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Faction Observations: Who's the strongest? Who's the best?

Post by Inuyasha »

How would people rank the the six factions in order of most fun to play and most powerful?

In terms of raw power, I would say:

1. Dwarves
2. Elves
3. Loyalists
4. Drakes
5. Northerners
6. Undead

Granted it depends a lot on map type and what teams are, but I think it's safe to say most people feel the undead are the weakest, or at least that they require the most careful playing. People also seem to say that the Drakes have gotten a lot more powerful, the last time I played Wesnoth they were considered fairly weak, which is interesting...
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JW
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Re: Faction Observations: Who's the strongest? Who's the be

Post by JW »

Inuyasha wrote:How would people rank the the six factions in order of most fun to play and most powerful?

In terms of raw power, I would say:

1. Dwarves
2. Elves
3. Loyalists
4. Drakes
5. Northerners
6. Undead
I would have to agree with most of this. The more I play, the more I find that the Northerners are underplayed. This is not direct evidence that they are underpowered, but it is surely evidence that they are unpopular with one possible cause being that they are underpowered.

Here's how I would rank the factions:

1. Dwarves
With great resistancies, high hp, high impact damage, thunderers instant battle swing potential, utility berserkers, and the best defensive unit in the game, the only thing the dwarves lack is mobility, which is covered in gryphons and footpads in certain eras. They seem somewhat overpowered to me.

2. Elves
With great mobility, high dodge in forest, and the most consistantly powerful ranged attacks in the game, elves come in second to the dwarves imo. Leadership can be surprisingly effective when you can get 1 or 2 fighters this bonus on a single unit. The mermen are a welcome addition as their mobile scout cannot cross deep water as the gryphons can.

3. Loyalists
This was a close race between 3rd and 4th imo. The Loyalists are more varied than the other races, and the HI can be brutal when used effectively, plus the skirmishing fencer becomes amazing after only 1 level, so I have to give 3rd to them.

4. Drakes
With very mobile but easy to hit units,the Drakes come in 4th for me. Their mobility serves them little when your opponent uses territorial advantages over you. The reason they get 4th for me is the fact that they are paired with saurians giving them lawful and chaotic units in the same faction. The drakes fight at day, the skirmishing saurians at night. In rumbles they fare much better however.

5. Undead
I have to give 5th to undead because an undead attack at night is one of the deadliest things that can happen. Adepts, if you can plan your attack right, are quite destructive. back them up with skeletons and perhaps a walking corpse to add to your army, or a ghost to ZoC your opponents main forces, and you can have quite a force. The reason they are this low is that they are too weak to impact, fire, and holy damage to maintain an offense normally. Opponents see undead and immediately recruit to counter. Somehow, I think this should be changed.

6. Northerners
With nothing making them stand out, Northerners get last in my opinion. Poison can be effective, but the hit unit often goes to the back lines while your assassin, with few hp, is usually killed. Also, with 4 units with no ranged attacks, they are by far the most uni-dimensional faction. Regeneration is nice, but smart opponents focus all their attacks to either kill regenerators in 1 turn, or what until only they are left to focus their attack. IMO, the weakest faction.
Inuyasha wrote:Granted it depends a lot on map type and what teams are, but I think it's safe to say most people feel the undead are the weakest, or at least that they require the most careful playing. People also seem to say that the Drakes have gotten a lot more powerful, the last time I played Wesnoth they were considered fairly weak, which is interesting...
While I agree that the players strategy determines the effectivenss of the units, some factions simply do not have the same abilities to adapt to differing situations. Because of this lack in flexibility, some factions are inherently weaker than others. You know my opinions on relative strengths.

For fun of use (IMO), switch 1 and 2, and 4 and 5.

Oh, and btw, you never ranked how fun each was for you. ;)
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zookeeper
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Re: Faction Observations: Who's the strongest? Who's the be

Post by zookeeper »

This is a really difficult question. The only clear opinion I have is that northerners are really, really bad.

I can't really put the factions into an order of preference, so I'll just list which faction I'd choose if I knew what the opponent had (and if I really wanted to win).

Against dwarves? Drakes or loyalists.
Against loyalists? Undead or elves.
Against drakes? Loyalists or elves.
Against elves? Undead.
Against undead? Dwarves or loyalists.
Against northerners? Drakes, loyalists, undead, elves or dwarves.
ade334
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Post by ade334 »

I've been playing multiplayer with my friend against 2 AI's, and we've found that as 2 loyalists, nothing can stand in our way. As loyalist/undead, only undead offer any resistance (the undeads always seem to pair up).

Against us, I'd rank the opponents as:

Drakes (always a pain)
Dwarves
Loyalists
Elves
Undead (dont make use of their bats)
Northerners

And how I prefer to play, I would rank them as:

Loyalists
Elves
Dwarves
Drakes
Undead
Northerners
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Tomsik
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Post by Tomsik »

ade334 wrote:(top of list)Drakes (always a pain)
huh?

What i think
:
1.Knaglans & Loyalists
2.Elves & Northrens
3.Undeads
4.Drakes
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Post by (S)elfish weirdo »

Y'know I was going to make a completly random unconstructive post in a completly random thread consisting only of the word "feh" to celebrate my hundreth post, however, it appears as if I was foiled by my own brilliance again, so therefor I will make use of the context, for without context "feh" has no meaning.

/me ranks them as:

1. The Drakeish ones, with their combined chaoticness and lawfulness along with extreme damage and speed.

2.Thee (D)warfishes, with thine incredible resilience and 'zerking nasties.

3.Thee royalistic fascist scum who *slaps his right brain half* have the best offensive navy and a fair share of flexibility including the most combat capable scouts.

4.Thee northie experience and upkeep spammers.

5.Thee Treehugging freaks with their lack of combat capable scouts.

6.Thee undeadish ones, with thine shared weaknesses, making a counter for one unit a counter for almost the entire faction which undead cannot respond to.

It shall be noted, however that I was not under the influence of caffeine cheese (the moon not calculated) while the writing of this, it might therefor be false and/or include pictures of midget ants including, but not restricted to matter.

It should also be noted that I consider the faction differences rather small; a good undead player can still beat a (D)warfish or a Royalist.

I consider that the worst balance problem in the game is the undeads l1 cold against drakes, which makes the strongest faction in the game usually fall prey for the weakest. (not that undeadies should be weaker than drakes)

Edit: after some considerations, the treehuggers dropped below the northies, mainly due to their lack of a combat capable scout.
Last edited by (S)elfish weirdo on November 16th, 2005, 9:13 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Disto
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Post by Disto »

One thing which becomes apparent from this is that Undead are obviously thought to be underpowered and the Northerners are either too boring to play or underpowered as well.
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Post by Assasin »

I would say that the dwarvish scum are probably the best faction in the game. they have everything except magic, which isn't that bad. the only think that bugs me is that they use chaotic humans. Why humans?

as the rest, i don't think that the undead and drakes are that bad. the undead are cheap to get and easy to mass. Their units are weaker then most but if you use them right they really aren't that bad. As the drakes, well they are almost the exact opposite. Darkes are expensive and it's hard to get a lot of them. But this is balanced out the the fact that they have very strong units.

The elves and humans are almost the same, except the elves have faster, harder to hit units and the loyalists have stronger, slower units.

in conclusion, i would say that they all rank #1 if you use them right. some are easier to use then others, like the elves for example. and some are harder to use, like the undead and drakes. All in all though, wesnoth rules :D
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Doc Paterson
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Post by Doc Paterson »

:P :P :P :P


Funny stuff here.

* * * * *
1. Northerners
2. Drakes
3. Loyalists
4. Knalgans
5. Elves
6. Undead

* * * * *

The new Undead are going to be a terror though......I can't wait. 8)
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Ankka
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Post by Ankka »

Doc Paterson wrote:
The new Undead are going to be a terror though......I can't wait. 8)
New undead? Whatthe... perhaps I should check the changelog.
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Post by Rastignac »

1.Dwarves (fighters cause panick and fear!)
2.Loyalist (maybe it's me but they lack of melee power?!)
3.Elves (woses can be problem; best ranged power!)
4.Northerners (I play with them mostly; archer looks ugly in green)
5.Undead (they have one obvious weak spot and then some more weakness)
6.Drakes (cute units; makes me sad if they start loosing rapidly at some point)
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Re: Faction Observations: Who's the strongest? Who's the be

Post by RedLTeut »

zookeeper wrote:This is a really difficult question. The only clear opinion I have is that northerners are really, really bad.
..

Against loyalists? Undead or elves.

Against undead? Dwarves or loyalists.
That would mean you consider loyalists and undead to be about even?
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Post by Elvish_Pillager »

Northies lost their mightyness back when all the other factions got their weak units turned into strong units...
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Post by Doc Paterson »

Elvish Pillager wrote:Northies lost their mightyness back when all the other factions got their weak units turned into strong units...
Completely wrong.
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Elvish_Pillager
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Post by Elvish_Pillager »

Doc Paterson wrote:
Elvish Pillager wrote:Northies lost their mightyness back when all the other factions got their weak units turned into strong units...
Completely wrong.
lol
It's all fun and games until someone loses a lawsuit. Oh, and by the way, sending me private messages won't work. :/ If you must contact me, there's an e-mail address listed on the website in my profile.
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