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I observe you, I see the hatred in your eyes, well hidden behind courteous ways. I listen. I know the terrifying darkness that hides behind your well-concocted lies. I await you on the edge of madness. I taste the pain of your mind, the spasmodic desire for the end of this charade. I live in the dark wells of your soul. In the shadows I favor the coming of my time. I wait patiently for you to open your eyes and realize that it is only by my will that you breathe. Because I am Tzeentch, and you are the puppet who dances to the rhythm of my music.
City
All factions, except the Hordes, control portions of the campaign map that appear as their own territory. Control over portions of the map is ensured by control of the Settlement within each of them.
Provinces and Settlements
The whole campaign map (excluding seas, which do not belong to anyone) is divided into Provinces, which are in turn divided into Settlements (from 2 to 4 each). By selecting any city on the map, you will see the other Settlements belonging to the same Province appear in the lower panel (regardless of who controls them).
TWW2 introduced two provinces each consisting of a single settlement: Sartosa Island, located off the Estalian coast, between Ulthuan and the Southern Badlands, and the Heart of the Jungle, in the middle of the Southern Lands. In the same Ulthuan there are also very particular provinces always of a single settlement called Gates, which we will discuss in other chapters of this guide.
The list of cities belonging to the Province, and its simplified summary panel on the left.
Each Settlement has its own buildings, but the vast majority of the effects of these buildings are automatically transmitted to all cities in the Province under your control. Recruiting skills, Public Order and Population, as well as Vampiric and Chaotic Corruption, are shared across the whole portion of the Province in the hands of a single player. The income generated, the garrisons and the fortifications, on the contrary, are specific to each single Settlement.
For this reason it is absolutely useless to own some buildings more than once in a single Province (for example those that only unlock the recruitment of new types of units), while owning more copies of others can be advantageous (for example defensive buildings, or that produce wealth).
Settlement and building level
Each Settlement has a level, which can range from 1 to 5 (if it is level 0, the Settlement is essentially destroyed). The level of the Settlement is dictated by a special building, always obligatorily present and shown in the upper left of the panel. Upgrading this building, in addition to some practical benefits, also raises the level of the Settlement by 1.
Each building in the Settlement also has a level, which is the minimum level that the Settlement itself must have in order for the building to be built. Some buildings will be level 1 (so they can always be built), while others may be of a higher level, and therefore be unlocked later. The vast majority of buildings can also be upgraded, producing new effects but also requiring a higher Settlement level with each upgrade (so, for example, a building that needs a Settlement level 2 for construction may need a level 3 to build. be upgraded the first time, and a level 4 to be upgraded the second time).
In TWW2, a building is always built to a level equal to the minimum level the settlement must have to unlock its construction. If a building requires a level three settlement to be built, it will already be built at level three. Then, if that building has an upgrade available only in a settlement of a higher level than the one required for the initial construction, then the building's level will increase to the level of the settlement that unlocks the upgrade. While a settlement always has all levels, from one to the maximum available, some buildings, especially the special ones (the strongholds), skip a few levels from the first available to their maximum degree of development, not being able to improve each time it leveled l settlement that hosts them.
Population surplus
To upgrade the central building of the settlement and thus level up the entire city, you need to spend Population Surplus points as well as money. In conditions of stability (and with the help of some buildings) the Province will constantly grow in population, generating over time a Surplus, which is spent when the level of a Settlement within the Province itself is increased.
The complete panel of the Province, which also shows the Settlements that compose it, the level of each of them and which buildings it contains and could contain.
Provincial capitals
Each Province has a capital, which you can immediately distinguish because it is always shown further to the left than the other Settlements in the bottom panel of the Provinces.
Capitals are different from other cities for two reasons: the native presence of defensive walls, even in the absence of dedicated buildings, and the ability to reach a level higher than that of the other Settlements (5 instead of 3). The second factor makes the Capitals particularly important as the only Settlement in the Province that can house level 4 or 5 buildings, which usually allow the recruitment of the most powerful units and Heroes.
decrees
If all the cities of a single province are controlled, it is possible to issue a decree for it. The Decrees consist of bonuses of various kinds that are applied to all the Settlements of the Province; in each territory only one decree can be active at a time. If you lose control of a Settlement, the Province Decree immediately ceases to function.
Public order
Public order is a factor on a provincial scale that can range from -100 to +100, and represents how happy the population is with your government. A Province with a high Public Order will grow faster, producing more Surplus points. If, on the other hand, the Public Order in a Province reaches -100, an army of rebels will automatically be generated, which will grow from turn to turn until it is large enough to attack the cities of the Province.
To find out what factors are affecting public order, simply move the cursor over its icon in any of the various summary panels of the Settlements and Provinces.
The decrees that can be issued in a province.
Attacking the Settlements
The only way to take control of a Settlement belonging to another faction is to attack it with an army and win the ensuing battle. If the Settlement you are fighting for has no fortifications the battle will be a normal pitched battle, while if it has defensive walls it will be a siege.
Whether the Settlement is walled or not, you can always decide to delay the attack and Encircle it. As long as a Settlement is Encircled by an enemy no army can enter or leave it (and an army inside cannot Reinforce the surrounding area, unless the besieging army itself is attacked), it is not possible to recruit or build. , and with each turn that elapsed the counter of the Supply Supply available to the Settlement decreases. If a city is surrounded for too long it will begin to suffer attrition (both the garrison and any army inside), and after a few more turns it will automatically capitulate, as if it had lost the battle without even fighting. When an Encirclement is interrupted, the Inventory counter is instantly and automatically reset.
It is good to remember that an army within a Settlement can never retreat, and therefore if it is attacked and defeated it will automatically be destroyed. For this reason, especially if the Settlement you want to defend is very weak, it is more prudent to provide it with support from the outside, rather than barricade itself within it at the risk of being trapped.
apron
Although an army within a encircled Settlement cannot leave it or take any other action, it can make a sortie against the besieging army. The battle resulting from the sortie is always pitched, even if the city would have been equipped with walls.
Even the garrison of an encircled Settlement can make a sortie, as if it were a real army (in addition to being able, of course, to intervene as Reinforcements if the army surrounding the city is attacked, either by a force inside the city itself or by from an external one). To do this, simply select the Settlement itself and right-click on the enemy army.
Sieges
When attacking a Settlement with defensive walls, it is possible (and sometimes necessary) to build siege equipment. The construction of siege equipment - Rams and Siege Towers - is ordered directly in the besieging army, is free and does not occupy army unit slots; the speed of construction and the maximum limit of equipment that can be possessed depend on the number of soldiers in the besieging army. When the siege ends or is broken for any reason, any built siege equipment is automatically lost.
Top left, the turns the Settlement can take before suffering attrition and capitulation, respectively. Top right, the points of equipment construction available to the besieging army and those that can be spent each turn. In the equipment sheets, the number of points needed to build them and under how many other machines of the same type have already been completed and available.
Conquest options
When you take control of a Settlement belonging to another faction following an attack, you can choose what to do with it.
Not all options are always present, depending on your faction and the type of Settlement conquered. All human factions and Vampire Counts can occupy each other's Settlements, as can Greenskins and Dwarves, but it is not possible for one of these factions to “leave its own party” and occupy the other's Settlements. Norsmanni can only occupy other Norsman Settlements, and hordes (such as Warriors of Chaos and Beastmen) can never occupy any city of any kind.
In TWW2, any faction can conquer any settlement, but settling in a territory other than the native one entails penalties. To learn more about the topic, refer to the article "Climates and territories".
Occupies
The Settlement becomes the property of the player who conquered it. Public Order in the Province will suffer slightly for a while, but the situation will stabilize quickly. If the faction that conquers the Settlement is different from the one that previously owned it, the Settlement itself and all its buildings are lowered by one level and converted into equivalent buildings of the new faction (any buildings with no direct equivalent are destroyed).
Occupy and loot
The Settlement is looted, producing immediate wealth for the conqueror in proportion to its size, and then becomes his property. The Settlement will be damaged, and Public Order in the Province will be hit hard.
Raid
The Settlement is looted, producing immediate wealth for the conqueror in proportion to its size, and then it is let go and returned to the player who owned it before the attack. The Settlement will be damaged, and Public Order in the Province will be hit hard.
Raze to the ground
The Settlement is completely destroyed, all buildings within it are automatically eliminated, and no one is considered to own that map region anymore. Chaos Warriors and Beastmen have variants of this option available, which also produce Horde Growth bonuses or wealth.
Colonize a destroyed Settlement
A razed Settlement can be recovered and rehabilitated by any faction that would normally be able to occupy it. To do this, an army must be sent to “conquer” the Settlement. The operation, in addition to a cost in money, will cause losses distributed to the whole army, exactly as if it had suffered a strong blow from Logormaneto (no units can however be destroyed in this way); the more men there are in the army (and will therefore be consumed by the recolonization), the lower the economic cost.
The recovered Settlement will start completely from scratch in terms of buildings and population.
The cash cost of Colonization, and the number of Army soldiers that will be lost.
Order
The Hordes are particular factions, with a different functioning from the others as regards territorial occupation. The Hordes can never own any Settlements of any kind, but each of their Army acts, at the same time, also as a “Mobile Settlement”, with its own constructible buildings and its own Population Surplus points. Horde Armies have a main building that determines the level of the "Settlement", but the number of empty building slots is always infinite, and Surplus points are spent on building every single building, not just the main one.
Each Army in a Horde recruits based on what has been unlocked from the buildings it contains, and never has access to Global Recruitment.
Economy
The various factions have nominally different currencies, but this is an aesthetic variation in fact only, and all of them follow the same exact general rules. When exchanging money between different factions, each type of currency is simply converted at a 1: 1 rate to that of the other side.
Funds and Budget
Each faction has a treasury with the funds available at that time, which can be spent to recruit, build and order special actions to the Heroes. It is not possible to make debt with these three operations, and if you do not have the necessary funds for one of them immediately it is simply impossible to order it.
At the top of the campaign map interface, next to the cash in hand, the income is shown. Revenue represents the amount of money that will go into your coffers at the start of your turn (if until then nothing happens or changes). By leaving the mouse cursor on the income icon you will have a quick overview of all the income and expenses of your faction. If the proceeds are negative, money will instead be subtracted from your funds, potentially sending you into debt as well.
It is possible to play with passive income (possibly a little) if you are particularly aggressive and raid enemy Settlements with good frequency, but given the prohibitive cost that some of the more advanced buildings reach, in this way you risk being always or on the on the verge of catastrophe or lacking adequate means in the final stages of the campaign.
Retention
All your armies and soldiers have an upkeep cost, which is automatically deducted from the faction's income. If your balance sheet is in deficit, it means that you are spending more money on keeping soldiers than you are earning in taxes and trade.
The upkeep cost of each unit is dictated by the type of unit itself (you can see it before you even recruit it, alongside the immediate recruiting expense), but it is increased by percentage depending on how many different Lords you have on the map at the same time. This means that, even on the purely economic front, it is highly recommended to rationalize the forces as much as possible, use a few Lords with many soldiers each and defend the nerve centers of the map with defensive buildings in the nearby Settlements, rather than with many small stationary armies.
The name of the mechanic changes from faction to faction, but the essence is the same: having multiple distinct armies increases the upkeep cost for all of them.
Bankruptcy
If you start your turn with a passive value of money, you will automatically enter a state called Bankruptcy. The Bankruptcy continues until you start a new turn and your owned money is zero or greater again.
As long as the Bankruptcy persists, all of your armies in play will suffer additional attrition from it.
Sources of income
In most cases the main source of income is your Settlements, especially if they are high-level and politically stable. It is not possible to regulate the level of taxation, which depends solely on the population and the buildings constructed; it is however possible to completely exempt a province from taxes, considerably reducing its production of wealth but increasing its public order.
Another major source of income, and the main one for a couple of races, is war - winning battles and using armies in Assault mode in enemy territory produces wealth, and looting a couple of big cities can quickly make you rich.
The third main source of income is trade, which nevertheless only plays a supplementary role with respect to taxes. Even by weaving large commercial networks and building an internal infrastructure of dedicated buildings and technologies to further enhance it, it is essentially impossible to keep one's economy afloat through trade alone.
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