Faction Breakdown

[erock123]

I have been BfW for a while now. I was wondering if anyone can give me a general breakdown on the different factions. In the game. Just a general description of the advantages and disadcantages of each faction.

[Crendgrim]

I suggest you to have a look at the How to Play Series. It's a bit outdated, but generally it still applies.


Crend

[erock123]

Thanks I will take a look at it

[Chefu]

First off as a disclaimer, I don't pretend any great skill at this game so take the below with a grain of salt. (++ is advantages and -- is disadvantages)

Loyalists - A very flexible daylight loving faction. They often prefer to fight in the open as that usually hurts the enemy more than themselves. The large variety of units gives them good flexibility for a large variety of strategies.

++ Good all round, high flexibility, access to magical attacks, and a pesky skirmishing unit
-- Harder to master


Rebels - A distinguishing feature is that almost all units have both a ranged and a melee attack which and are very terrain-dependent (a huge defensive boost in forests). When caught in the open however, they tend to be weaker than their human counterparts.

++ Most units have both ranged and melee, great def in forests, access to slow and basic heal in lvl 1 recruit
-- Tend to be weaker than others outside forests (lower hp)


Northeners - A spam faction. Their units are quite cheap and they are known for staging ugly rushes at night. Poison is a crucial tool in their arsenal as it enables them to cripple a counter-attack during the day as well as get units out of favourable terrain due to the additional marksman ability. Although typically aggressive, they also have good defensive potential with grunts in villages and regenerating trolls on mountains.

++ Cheap units, access to poison and a regenerating tank, generally high hp
-- Not so powerful attacks


Knalgans - Composed of tough slow dwarves who have great defenses on mountains (but bad elsewhere) and fast fragile outlaws who have good defenses everywhere. They have great defensive units (guardsmen, esp. on villages) while fighters (and thieves with backstab at night) have good firepower. They tend to lack ranged power though. The ulfserker unit spell death to most ranged units in its path due to its beserk ability. It is very effective for putting psychological pressure on your opponent.

++ Good resistances, good defenses in mountains
-- Slow, bad defenses in the open, not-so-great ranged attacks


Undead - A chaotic faction with very unusual resistances. Most units are very weak to arcane, fire and impact attacks while being quite resistant to blade, cold and particularly pierce attacks. In general they tend to be slower than the other factions but very aggressive.

++ Great resistances to the most common attack types, great at village stealing, access to poison (really shines when defending against melée), magical attacks (Dark adept)
-- Bad other resistances, slow

Drakes - Fast and Furious. These are very powerful as well as mobile but have bad defenses and are very expensive. Most units are very resistant to fire attacks. Their great mobility gives them a strategic edge to determine when and where a battle will be fought.

++ Fast, powerful, resistant to fire attacks, good movement over rough terrain, access to basic-level healing/magical attacks, access to pesky skirmishers.
-- Bad defenses, expensive, weak to cold attacks

[Velensk]

I'll give my twist to the above. This is mostly rephrasing but there are a few things I think you had wrong.

I'd be careful with using phrases like "loyalists are hard to master" as that really isn't a true disadvantage (nor is it true for most people I know). That is rather subjective, and even then, after you master it does that leave them without disadvantage? I would say no, loyalists still have their disadvantage. Also, many of the things listed for knalgans assume that the knalgans will be using mostly dwarves. Try to give your list with all available playstyles in mind.

Loyalists:
++Core infantry are both effective and cost efficent, versatility of recruiting options, very combat capable scouts
--No terrain bonuses, specialists tend to be less cost efficent (though can still be worthwhile), very dependant on Time of Day without being particuarly mobile (except the aforementioned scouts).

Rebels:
++Versitile core units (good access to ranged damage), good combat/moblity in forests, access to many useful supporting abilities
--Base units have low hitpoints

Northerners:
++ Units tend to be both cheap and durable, access to many useful attrician abilities, good mobility in hills
-- Low damage per hexside and associated effects, lack of significant ranged damage (until 1.9)

Knalgans
++Units can be among the most effective and efficent in the right situation (situation dependant on unit), can defend almost any type of terrain decently with the right unit, dwarves are not slowed by many common terrains, outlaws level quickly
--Units correspondingly likely to be among the least effective/efficent when not in their ideal situation which when combined with dwarves limited mobility frequently makes a distinct lack of versatility.

Undead:
++Resistances can make many of your enemies most efficent units less effective, cheapest scouts, effective/efficent magical ranged firepower, access to many special abilities
--Weaknesses mean that your enemy will likely just recruit the things that counter you anyway, main army very slow despite being very ToD sensitive

Drakes
++Very mobile, powerful and/or accurate attacks, easy access to rare damage types, dual alignment, between drakes and saurians have resistance to all common damage types, drakes have high hitpoints and saurians have high defense
--between drakes and saurians has vulnerabilities to all common damage types, all units are weak to cold, drakes have low defense and saurians have low hitpoints, expensive

[Aelaris]

Here's another way to look at them:

Offensive: Kills units outright, then uses the resulting superior numbers to not die. Bit weak in straight-up combat. Tries to stay out of combat when not decapitating the enemy at nightfall.
Defensive: Loves their favored terrain, bit weak / cost ineffective off of it.
Balanced: All-around good offense and defense, superior when not decapitated or attacking against superior terrain.

Thus:

Drakes: Lawful Offensive (Chaotic Defensive).
Drakes have high offense, but are cost ineffective in pitched combat due to low defenses. They do, however, have the Saurians to cover their tails during the night, and saurians are Defensive Chaotic.

Loyalists: Lawful Balanced.
Good all around, with a unit for everything. Obviously offense during the day, and defense during the night - can do both just fine. What every player should start with, and eventually return to. Faction teaches every tactic other than how to cover your tails with opposite alignment folks, but that only matters for the unloved Drakes.

Rebels: Neutral Defensive (Lawful Offensive)
Elves love their trees and defend during their opponent's good times, and attacks during their opponent's weak ToD. Packs some mages to hit hard during the day against non-lawfuls. Defends via dodgy, generally quick.

Knalgans: Neutral Defensive (Chaotic Offensive)
Dwarves love their mountains or hills, and defend during their opponent's good times. More specialty units than the elves, and stronger defense (Resistances all the time, more HP, dodgy on mountains.), but generally slow. Packs a merry band of brigands to provide a Chaotic Offensive against non-chaotics.

Northerners: Chaotic Balanced.
Chaotic loyalists? Yes, but with fewer specialty units that are more specialized (particularly assassins). High HP tends to cause them to win gold-wise in a clean fight, but units are cheap, and not great individually. Struggles a bit with offense, since it's hard to pack a punch without three or four units attacking. While not terrain-reliant, more survivable on the defense due to having high HP rather than strong retaliation - note that the HP is not affected by ToD.

Undead: Chaotic Offensive.
DA's have a 49% chance of hitting twice for about 22 damage during the night, and a 91% chance of hitting once. Two DA's have a 65% chance to deal 33 damage, and a 91% chance to deal 22. All this from a 16 cost unit. The sacrifice? No retaliation and low HP.
Similarly, the rest of the faction also relies on hitting who you choose, and not being hit by those you don't want to be hit by. Most units have strong resistances, and incredible weaknesses, so you play a lot of killing things that threaten your weaknesses before they matter. DA's kill the melee-heavy units that are best suited to kill them. Skeletons Chop Chop Chop the Mages and other specialty units that are best suited to kill them. But if they don't... well, the Undead can't even run away as good as Drakes.


Now, each faction has a bunch of unit-specific quirks, and occasionally specific strategies. There's Ghost/Bat spam from the Undead - another example is playing wolf-rider/assassin northies, poisoning folks and denying them villages to return to. These can be done, but aren't the generic strategy I'm describing.

Also, a lot of specialty units buck the general strategy, and counterbalance it - that's why they are specialty units, and boy are they important. But Dwarvish Ulfserkers don't make Dwarves as a whole offensive like Drakes or Undead - they just provide offensive options to a defensive/terrain-based faction.

So that's my two thoughts on describing how the factions play, rather than describing how to play each faction. Providing a general perspective, perhaps.