How to play Loyalists2

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re-writing in progress. Nothing here is final. It will be completed shortly.

Loyalist units

Spearman is a basic combat unit with ability to strike and retaliate before his enemies.

• good defense in mountains and villages
• lawful, can be upgraded into 3 useful units (balanced melee/ranged javelineer and melee units with strong blade or pierce damage)
• strong vs drakes, cavalry and ulfserkers; weak vs skeletons and skeleton archers
• strong melee attack with first strike (pierce), weak ranged attack (pierce)

Heavy Infantryman is very slow, but powerful defender. He can hit hard and have great resistances and low defenses.

• low defenses, wlo and cannot reach mountain hexes
• lawful, but can have fearless trait to fight well any time
• strong vs skeletons and melee fighters; weak vs mages, dune burners and orcish archers
• strong melee attack (impact)

Fencer is quick skirmisher. He asi faster than most loyalist units and he is a good support, not a frontline unit. Good for blocking enemy units.

• maximum defense in multiple terrains (70%), but low hitpoints
• lawful
• strong against wounded units; weak in 1vs1 fighting
• strong melee attack (blade)

Horseman is a very important unit. During day, they can use their charged attack to kill some units in a single strike. Better in offense than in defense. Very expensive unit (23 gold)

• low defenses, but good resistances to blade and impact weapons.
• lawful, can be upgraded into 2 useful units (balanced knight and very offensive lancer)
• strong when attacking; weak in defending
• strong melee attack (blade) with charge

Cavalryman is a mixture of horseman and fencer. Balanced unit with good resistances, low defenses and quick movement. Good mobility on flat lands, slow on difficult terrains.

• low defenses, but good resistances to blade and impact weapons.
• lawful
• strong against grunts, augurs and even dark adepts; weak to spearmen, skeletons and archers
• strong melee attack (blade)

Bowman is the only ranged unit of the loyalists, not counting mages. While they are weak in melee fighting, all other units will not retaliate to enemy archers.

• good defense in mountains and villages
• lawful
• strong vs drakes and anyone with no or limited ranged attack; weak vs ulfserkers and skeletons
• weak melee attack (blade), strong ranged attack (pierce)

Mages are in both rebel and loyalist armies. They provide fire damage in their magical ranged attack.

• good defense in mountains and villages, but low hitpoints
• lawful, can be upgraded into 2 useful units (white mage is a good healer, while red mage provides excellent damage)
• strong against skeletons, saurians, ghosts; weak when not protected by other units
• weak melee attack (impact), strong magical ranged attack (fire)

Merman Fighter is a melee warrior connected with water.

• good defense in water (50-70%)
• lawful
• strong on maps with lots of water and swamps; weak on maps with small amount of water
• strong melee attack (pierce)

Starting troops - random opponent

(95 gold)

When you don't know which faction you are facing, it is good to get a mixture of units.

White mage is an obvious pick. Healer and good ranged attacker against undead and drakes. Lieutenant is another solid option, because he can use his leadership in a battle. Swordman is another usable unit, because he is a very good fighter, stronger and more resilient than lieutantants in melee combat.

General Loyalist Strategy

Loyalists are considered to be the most versatile faction in the game. They have most available unit types to recruit (8), more than any other faction. Loyalists are mostly melee oriented faction, with only two ranged unit types, the mage and the bowman, but their ranged units play a significant role in the loyalists strategy and have to be used effectively. About the melee troops the loyalist player gets to choose among:

• Heavy Infantrymen: few strikes, high damage per strike, slow, higher hitpoints, good resistances, low defenses, deals impact damage which is good against undead
• Spearman average strikes, average damage per strike, average movement, medium hitpoints, normal resistances, average defenses, deals pierce damage which is good against drakes, has a weak ranged attack
• Fencer: high number of strikes, low damage per strike, quick, low hitpoints, bad resistances, good defenses, deals blade damage which is good against elusive foots or wose, deals less total damage than the other two, is a skirmisher.

The loyalists unit price ranges from the cheap spearmen and mermen (14 gold) to the expensive horsemen (23 gold).

Loyalist units generally have good hitpoints and they deal good damage, even the cheap spearmen and bowmen. Even their scouts have high hitpoints and better melee attack compared to most of the scouts of the other factions. But OTOH, the loyalist scouts have lower defences than most of the other scouts and they do not have a ranged attack.

The loyalists have some units with good resistances, like HI or Cavalryman, which can be very good for defending if you notice that your opponent doesn't have the proper units to counter them. Other units, like the bowman, who is more vulnerable than the previous two, but is also good for defense because it has better defense, is cheaper and it deals solid damage back in both melee and range. Similar goes for the spearman.

When attacking, Loyalists have units which can be pretty devastating, like the horseman for attacking enemy magi and other ranged units, magi against the entrenched melee units, fencers for killing enemy injured and valuable units trying to heal behind their lines. But the mentioned units are also very vulnerable and they can die very easily if not properly supported.

The loyalists as a faction generally have average defenses (they do not get 70% defense anywhere, with the exception of the fencer, which is a special case) and they are not a terrain dependent faction (like the Elves or Knalgans are). Therefore, even if it good to put spearmen and bowmen on mountains, villages and castles where they get 60% defense, you should also take the faction you are facing into account when deciding where to place your units. For example, if you are fighting knalgans, you should try not to move your units next to hills and mountains and/or take the hills and mountains with your units and leave the forest to the dwarves.

All the loyalist units are lawful, which obviously leads to the conclusion that the loyalists should be more aggressive and attack at day (or even start at dawn, because your opponent in most of the cases will be reluctant to attack too aggressively and leave units on bad ground when the morning arrives) while at night the loyalists should at least play conservatively, or in some cases even run away. Of course, that is also dependent upon the faction of your opponent.

The greatest weakness of the loyalists is their limited mobility. The loyalists' units have normal movement, some of their units like the horseman, cavalryman, merman fighter and the fencer are pretty quick when they are in their favorable environment, but all their units get slowed over rough terrain a lot compared to the other factions' units. Half of the loyalists units can not even move on/over mountains, and their scouts get significantly slowed in forest, for example. This lack of mobility will often give your opponent an opportunity to outmaneuver you in the game. To prevent that, sometimes it is good to attack hard on a certain point and defend only with minimal amount of units elsewhere, rather than uniformly spreading your units around the front.

Villages

Spearmen, bowmen and of course fencers are good to hold villages. You can also use units like Heavy Infantry or cavalier, but their defenses are weaker. Use your fencers and cavaliers to grab villages quickly. You can also use horsemen to attack enemy with their powerful attack and take enemy village next turn, but it is very dependant on remaining hitpoints. Mermen are obvious choice for water and swamp villages.

Loyalists vs Loyalists

A B+ B C C C D+ D-

Loyalists in mirror match means a lot of possibilities on each side. 8 units vs 8 units. Some of them are only good against cavalry, some only against mages... so your tactics should be a lot about rock-paper-scissor strategy. Find out what exactly is your enemy doing. It is possible that all units will be used again and again.

You must be ready to spearmen rush, cavalier rush or any other rushes - and expect fighting all the time, because all units are lawful. Cavalry might be good here, but they can be forced to retreat by spearmen and other cavalry. Fencers might be killed by mages and mages by fencers. So this game will be a lot of fun, or a lot of defending.

Horseman, cavalryman and fencers are fast on flat plains, while units like heavy infantry is very slow. Killing mages is always a good idea, because mage upgraded to white or red variant is very useful for his team.

Think about targets for your attacks. Mages can be killed easily, so think twice how many of them will you want. While fencers are weak, they can be your "ecomony" guy, if he and some of your cavalry can get deep into enemy territory and take some villages. Trading fencer for mage is nice, because difference is 4 gold.

Spearman: Good unit for everything. It can attack and defend with their good melee attack, even with help of the first strike ability. Use them a lot. They can also collect experience with their weak ranged attack, when holding the line. They are good against horsemen, cavalryman, fencers and mages. Try to not attack heavy infantry of course.

Heavy Infantryman: Defensive unit, usable vs spearman and cavalry. Slow when moving and retreating.

Fencer: One or two will not hurt. Use them on good terrain, because they might die fast. Also mages can burn them with ease.

Horseman Good unit, but not in loyalist vs loyalist. Can be used against other cavalry, but your money (horseman costs 23 gold) will be better spend elsewhere. 2 spearman and one bowman (42 gold) is better than 2 horseman (46 gold)

Cavalier: Take one for village grabbing, but this is not the best unit you can use against loyalists.

Bowman: Your "poke" guy. They will weaken enemy, but you have other units for killing.

Mage: Your best damage dealer. They can attack spearmen, heavy infantryman, mermen or any other units. Make sure to protect then well, because mages (and especially ones with quick trait) can die quickly. Use them as support unit, not as the main fighting units. Fencers are their arch enemies. Alternate approach is to get as much villages as possible with your fastest units and rush mages with escort in ratio 1:1.

Merman Fighter: Good in water. Who have more of them usually wins, but making too much of them will mean that your land units will be weaker.