‘ It was a brisk and foggy morning when I saw it, Goblins beyond numbers, marching quick and together. Supplies tethered and loaded on Wargs, followed behind by giant siege engines, pulled through the mud by lumbering Trolls. I spent enough time as a Mariner to know an invasion when I see it, the Goblins have abandoned the deep caves for a Warlord who covets the surface. I pray to the Allfather that this is not the end of the Commonwealth.’ — ‘Last diary entry of a wetlands grain farmer’ by Alard Truesail, deceased

Key Skills:



Training Regiment: Training Regiment 20% reduction in gold cost, combined with Karissa’s Rally and Goblin Racial will substantially lower the breakpoints of production cost for 1 and 2 turning many important units. Using the methods prescribed in the guide you will have a 87.5% chance of having this skill in the first 7 turns.



Raise Militia: While typically a dubious proposition particularly in early game when outpost growth is crucial to production, this skill fits perfectly with Goblin as their 20% population growth bonus and generous economic governance bonus to population makes this the perfect fit to save precious outpost production and make untouchables without wasting precious outpost production.

Skill Strategy:

Because of the importance of Training Regiment, your three skill choices ought to contain no empire upgrades as any empire upgrades especially within the first 3 tiers will substantially lower the probability of an early Training Regiment. Secondly to achieve the early breakpoints you must also have Shadowborn, which comes with it a 5% reduction to gold for infantry and pikemen. There are many good choices but as long as your third slot is shadowborn and your first two skills contain few or no spellbook clutter for the empire upgrade slots all can be viable, I recommend adept/mastery of Water and Shadowborn.

First few turns:

The strategy of settling is a complicated one, the factors to consider are numerous generally speaking you will want 9-19 wetland tiles depending on the timing of your Training Regiment/Barracks. With 9 wetland tiles and your hero in your city, you will achieve 26 production which will allow you to build a 4 turn barracks instead of a 5 turn. With 13 wetlands tiles you can achieve 29 production which is the most important breakpoint as it is the cost of a marauder with the training regiment upgrade. The combo of 1 turn produced marauders and raise militia untouchables will set the stage for extremely aggressive expansion for your early creeping. If you do not roll training regiment for your initial two empire upgrades immediately research Warfare 1and begin casting seek inspiration. Warfare 1 being itself an empire upgrade will on completion “fish” out a third slot empire upgrade for an additional chance at training regiment and on turn 4 you should have your third chance, as well as be able to cast seek inspiration for an additional 3 chances. Depending on the exact probabilities of this, the chance of success of this method is between 75% and 93% depending on how the rolls function. With this initial setup, you can quickly get out a functional army with heroes and untouchables protected by marauders who should be able to clear weak tile guards in auto combat with as much dependability as can be mustered from goblins lowered health pool.

Mid Game: Mid Game is about adapting and your strong start should allow you to expand and tech, Goblins have many great options it is important that you keep in mind not only production cost but the output of your cities each turn. Goblins will grow very fast into high production outposts and you will have to make the choice between quality or quantity, I believe this choice is best served by the individual as this guide cannot account for everything. Doctors, Big Beetles, and Phalanx will make a great Seal holding team while Goblin Warg Rider spam with veteran volunteer can harass deep into your enemies territory to try and stifle economy by forcing substantial garrisons and enemy at the gates penalty on the cheap. Swarm Darters with no line of sight penalty make for obscene garrisons to protect your numerous cities and your ability to supplement with raise militia spam and the synergy of untouchables will keep your defenses well established.

Late Game: There are a lot of nasty Tier 4, but making it here as Goblin and a Warlord means that you are most probably ahead of the curve on tech and/or governance and you now have access to Tame Trolls to bring guard break into your tool set. The Warlord game exploders like Global Assault should start making appearances and a stack of manticore riders is the real reason that you suffered the warlord’s early game woes.

Key Units:

Marauders are not highly regarded by the community, this is for good reason and many of the summoning classes have no need or use of them. 10 def with a shield is however all things considered for tier 1 not a bad meat shield against physical ranged or melee. Additionally volunteer on veteran (which stacks with inspire loyalty if you are curious) helps to secure Goblin Warlord as an economic powerhouse.

Goblin Untouchables are a fantastic irregular unit, and their extreme fragility can be mitigated by making sure they have a substantial infantry screen disgusting stench with noxious vulnerability and high ranged blight damage make sure that if left to alone Untouchables will bring substantial damage and with Raise militia they do not necessarily cost precious warlord production time in the vulnerable early game.

Blight Doctors are absolutely essential goblin units weakness prevents many blight immune or resistant mobs from turning them irrelevant with blight vulnerability and steal enchantment can also be used puzzlingly to steal your own units debuffs if something particularly nasty is on your frontline troops.

Goblin Phalanx are fantastic front line units, life steal helps mitigate the lowered health and these will provide a good screen to keep units off your insanely fragile but necessary Blight Doctors.

Manticore riders are the ace in the hole for a warlord strategy, the second they start being produced your chances of winning skyrocket as they are arguably the strongest tier 4, manticore doom stacks still exist and much of Warlord strategy rests on survival to tech to this point.

Disclaimer:

This guide is in no way extensive, I have over 200 hours of multiplayer experience with both random players and close friends who have a great amount of exposure with the genre. However there are always bigger fish in any pond and it should be disclaimed that these methods may and could be primitive compared to top players. With no major tournament and few multiplayer streamers it is hard in this community to establish credibility so do not take anything from this guide as law. I wrote this guide to try and help others be able to thrive as Warlords and hope some find it helpful to improve their play.

Additional Info:

Unit Production Breakpoints:

Goblin Scout 21

Goblin Marauder 29

Goblin Untouchable 31

Goblin Swarm Darter 49

Goblin Berserker 55

Goblin Butcher 58

Goblin Warg Rider 63

Goblin M Hunter 70

Goblin B Doctor 81

Goblin M Archer 87

Goblin Phalanx 116

Goblin B Beetle 119

Tame Troll 140

Goblin W Breed 154

Goblin M Rider 220?

Heroes: Hero strategy is easier for Goblins than most, wetlands foraging makes the need for healing leaders less necessary. Investment in blight damage via necros or rogues can pay dividends with synergies with blight doctors, rot, and untouchables. When your enemies class/race is discovered I would try to fish side board heroes like an arcane binding sorcery vs a summon class or a dreadnought when facing elves.

Autocombat tactics: Autocombat is an art form, the AI has particulars and what you can get away with without taking casualties takes study and repetition. In general you want to pair units of similar movepoints so they stick together. Remember to micro your leader buffs, switching your leader from warlord to priest can add resistance to your tier 1 and save them from untimely death so splitting your stacks via a 28 movement and a 36 movement stack can keep casualties low. Study the habits of the AI and build and deploy accordingly. Remember you can split your stacks and that the initiating units power matters when choosing to fish for a mercy decision. Your Leader will always trump your Heroes and only the first hero in the stack will be giving out leadership bonuses so adjust your attack coordination to minimize losses and overpower the guards whenever possible.

Necromantic circles/Rogue outposts/ect.: These never spawn units till turn 6, so be aggressive with that scouting before turn 6, I recommend killing these quickly before they send more powerful stacks and to allow you free reign to expand

Farms: Farms are with their associated governance trait and/or expander skill downright city worthy with just the tile itself +20 gold and 100-150 pop (more if a dread) any cleared farm is in my opinion worthy of plopping a city down if safety can be guaranteed.