Which faction fits aggressive play?

[Kazboh]

I recently got this game and I've found that I play rather aggressive. What are some factions that fit this playstyle? I've been playing Loyalists and sometimes Drakes. Is there any other faction I should try? Thanks.

[ArKFallen]

I recently got this game and I've found that I play rather aggressive. What are some factions that fit this playstyle? I've been playing Loyalists and sometimes Drakes. Is there any other faction I should try? Thanks.

Northerners are probably a decent fit. The stock unit has good hp and 2 strong melee attacks. Calvary that can go over hills and mountains. Lacking in ranged but they have an archer with a ranged fire attack and an assassin with a ranged poison attack. Troll whelps regenerate and are far less resistant chaotic Heavy Infantry with 70% cost.

[Scorpius]

Terminating lurker mode ...................... done.

I consider the Undead to be pretty aggressive, especially if you play them like I often do and go a bit on the heavy side with Adepts. In fact, the Undead are the best faction to make too prone attacks and get away with it if you ask me. Bring a bat along to be pesky and, even if you make just one kill and get one village for one or two turns, the enemy army will be more often than not soo spread about the map they cannot attack (much efficiently) during day. Or you can bring "1 (one) ACME Brand Walking Corpse" along too just to leave him sitting on a village (especially if you are second player) since chances are the enemy will spend two or maybe three units to kill it, and that's units not attacking you, and effectively cutting your losses to 9 gold (and maybe 1 village if the map is smallish).

Orcs I also consider very aggressive, they are chaotic as well, meaning you can (and many times have to) attack during the first night, and since they are so cheap, you can often establish an advantage just due to the sheer numbers you can often throw at them. Granted, you don't do that much damage, but since enemy units will positively be on the brink of death after your attack, they have to retreat anyway, and if they decide to desperado you during the night (which they might, just because you will have so many villages by this point), chances are their soldiers are going to kill themselves, or do no damage because they will most often have just enough archers to kill one of your Grunts. Wolves are fair bait as well. Get 2 or 3 of them after one of these and then have it laugh at them because they just gave you even more villages.

Also, on the statement of trolls being orc HI of sorts, I disagree. They don't actually deal that much damage (9-2 at their favorite ToD is nothing to write home about, but, granted, it adds up) and thus, unlike HI, have next to no line breaking power and actually take significant retaliation, so trolls are actually your damage soakers. A troll dies, you just lost a measly 13 gold, some 3 or 4 units have got to expose themselves ( and possibly get hurt ) during the process, and you lost absolutely no momentum (they just did). For instance, imagine that one mage attacks your HI. He is liable to throw 20(maybe 10, but also 30) damage its way, and then one single archer comes and finishes the job. Man, you just lost 28 damage, 19 gold and a chunk of your momentum (and most probably the line if you are usinhg it that way). HI are useful because they don't take much damage from retaliation. Sure, if your enemy got nothing else than a bunch of Grunts or Spearmen at his disposal then yes, chances are they will kill themselves trying to remove you. But HI is actually kind of fragile against some units (trees anyone?), and imho performs better as a mage of sorts. Also, troll has more raw HP and no glaring weakness (yeah, -20% arcane, but who uses that anyway?)

As for loyalist, they are kind of aggressive, but they are lawful. Sure, you are the king of the hill during day, provided you didn't get murdered too much during first night. On large maps, and since they are on the slowish side, you may have trouble reaching your targets during the day, so be cautious. However, if you do manage to attack, chances are you are going to absolutely demolish your enemy.

Drakes... Drakes are weird. They are lawful, so same problem than Loys at first night. Unlike Loyalist, Drakes are all pathetic defenders (clashers might work in a pinch, but even then they might get pelted with arrows and just die) and so you might be in trouble if against chaotic. Also unlike loyalists, you are positively THE most mobile race overall, and do EVEN MORE damage than loyalists at day (per unit, damage overall is slightly less because your damage dealers are all very expensive). So, the game should ideally be like VROOOOOOM!!!! AAAAAAAARGH!!!! VROOOOOOM!!!!!. Snipe their units one at a time. Make your kills while making it so that, if they manage to kill one drake, they are in for a world of hurt. And if they do not attack, don't worry, you will overrun them eventually.

Knalgans might play aggressive, that's known as HODOR (maybe 1 or 2 dwarfs mixed in for good measure, do it at your own risk), but you WILL be in for a helluva time if it turns out your enemy is Undead. I think there are threads around for HODOR (and Knalgans in general) which may offer you way better advice than I do (that also goes for the other factions, but still...)

AAAANNND.... Elves! Oh god, how I hate Elves. I don't like elves. Elves cannot attack. Elves need forest more than they need air to breathe. I hate playing against a good Elf as well. They won't kill you. You will just kill yourself trying to remove them from their forests, and that's annoying. Someone beam in on this.

OH MAH GAWD! That was long! Hope it helps!

Oh, and if someone beams in and thinks I'm posting a truckload of nonsense, by any means, please throw as much criticism my way as you can muster. I too am struggling to improve.

[Eagle_11]

Orcs,orcs,orcs,orcs,orcs,orcs,orcs.
Grunt spam ftw. :p But dont forget to open with scouts. :p
Other than that you can try saurian focused drake play with constant presurre and dwarves can be played aggresively, even when defending.

[Velensk]

I think this very much depends on how you want to define aggressive.

-Do you define as as having a strategic need to constantly apply pressure to enemy positions?
-Do you define it as having the capability to blast through enemy defenses?
-Do you define it as being able afford to be constantly in the fray?
-Do you define it as being able to put together a strong rush?

All of these lend themselves to different factions.
-By the first definition, drakes are by far the most aggressive. Drakes do not want to be fighting on their own turf and have the mobility to threaten their enemies position in numerous ways. Drakes defend themselves by threatening to attack or by running away and you don't want to have to run from your own villages. Undead come in second in this regard. They lack the mobility of the drakes but above all other factions, undead do -not- want to be caught fighting at the wrong time of day (unless you're doing a ghoul/corpse strategy). As such undead must constantly force the enemy back so that they have room to retreat (this being particularly important as they are not very mobile).

-By the second definition: Loyalists are the king. Loyalists have the tools to break open any fortification and have enough power in their mobile units to allow for some very aggressive maneuvers. With powerful magical artillery, skirmishers, strong scouts, and high damage on their cheap core units, it's generally a bad idea for any faction to be fighting them at their preferred time of day and hard to prevent them from getting into position in preparation for day. Undead again come in second as they have abundant access to strong cost efficient magic and have cheap village stealers. They also get poison and a few other things to help. I'd say that the lack of mobility/traits makes them a little less scary in this regard than loyalists.

-By the third definition: Northerners come out ahead by a mile. Boasting both the first and second best units in terms of hp/cost northerners can put a lot of units out there and easily maraud villages to replace their loses. Trolls and assassins make great value in sustained combat and the ease of replacing grunts means your enemy must spread their resources very thin trying to reclaim/protect villages, kill off your units, and form good formations to avoid losing more units/villages. No other faction comes close to northerners in this regard.

-By the final definition, the northerners again come out ahead. As mentioned, a well done grunt rush can spread most factions too thin to protect all their villages and the grunts themselves can do good damage that first night. On some maps, undead can also put together a nightmare. Surprisingly, knalgans actually can put together a pretty scary rush with their outlaws (though that can be hosed if your enemy has the wrong faction). Saurian rushes are much like outlaw rushes except much more likely to run into an enemy that can deal with them well.

[Max_Damage]

Factions which can quickly and reliably kill units. Loyalists, Drakes, Rebels. Sometimes Undead with those Adepts.

[UK1]

Sorry if this is a gravedig, but I've thought about this myself. Depends on your definition of aggressiveness. I guess if I'm defining aggressiveness by factions that rely on decisive offensives, I'd have to rank them:

1: Drakes
2: Undead*
3: Loys
4: Rebels
5: Orcs
6: Knalgans

*In many 1v1 maps and a couple 2v2 maps, Undead can very effectively uses ghouls, some adepts, maybe a skeleton, then just recruit a ton of corpses to build up ad infinitum and win that way. In this case they want to play defensively and only force the opponent back to prevent dawn assaults. If you can have the opponent on their own turf at dawn or even Second Watch then high-tail it, they'll be toast if they try to attack you at D1. There's even one map (Den of Onis) that I won't play on because the undead build-up strategy is just so ridiculously OP. The reason is that there are no villages in conflict at all and an absurd amount of space in between the closest villages. Building up as Undead or even Orcs is nearly unbeatable on that map.