Reikland Guide Immortal Empires: Total War Warhammer III

Reikland has been around the Total War Warhammer franchise ever since its release back in 2016. Yet in Total War Warhammer III Immortal Empires, the players are struggling with the Reikland campaign due to many factors. Firstly, misunderstanding the different faction mechanics such as Imperial Authority could lead to all counts declaring war on you. Secondly, Reikland is now surrounded by enemies such as the Fecundites, and the Warherd of the One-Eye just to name few. These enemies not only will declare war on you, but they will also destroy the other electors which will decrease the Imperial Authority. Thus, leading to decreasing Karl grip over the Empire leading to a civil war. All of that is making this campaign a nightmare for many players. In this guide however, we will go over all the different obstacles to make this campaign much more enjoyable as it is intended to be.

Reikland Exclusive Mechanics

Reikland head of the empire has many mechanics that were added after the rework back in Total War Warhammer III. The rework was a huge thing, but it is now a burden for many players in Warhammer III. The presence of new enemies, and the misunderstanding of the Imperial mechanics are causing players to sink in unending wars. So let us break down all the different mechanics of the Empire before diving into the actual steps to build an early empire.

Prestige

Prestige is the green laurel wreath icon on the right side of the Imperial Authority meter. This resource is very important as it will allow the player to do many important things in the game. For instance it will allow the player to either improve the relations with the different elector counts including the player himself, or even to decrease the relations between the counts leading to war. Most importantly, it allows the interaction with various events which will increase Imperial Authority in return. Thus it is very important to keep it high.

Prestige

Prestige could be gained by winning battles, expanding and upgrading the empire, and interacting with various events.

Imperial Authority

Imperial Authority is something that defines the Empire as a whole. High Authority means full control over the whole empire, more respect from the elector counts, and in return many bonuses throughout the campaign. In contrary low authority will cause to various penalties that will lead to civil war, in other word all of the elector counts will declare war on the player.

Imperial Authority

Imperial Authority has many levels of which only the highest will reward the player, and all the rest will penalize him instead. The different levels and effects are as follow:

This show how important it is to work on the authority and keep it high. To increase the Authority it is very important to keep in mind that keeping all Elector Counts alive is key. For instance once an Elector has been wiped out the Authority will decline, hence it is crucial to retake his cities and revive the faction which will increase Authority again. Moreover, Authority can be increased through spending prestige in various events that are randomly generated.

Elector Counts and Fealty

The land of the empire is divided into thirteen different provinces, and the head of the province is an Elector Count. At the start of the campaign you will notice a coin beside the portrait of each elector. This addresses his Fealty towards you, and it is ranked from Zero to Ten. At Zero the elector will declare war on you, while at Ten an event will pop up allowing you to confederate the elector at the cost of Authority. If confederation was not made, you will be rewarded with additional Authority, and the event will occur after 20 turns. Thus no rush directly accepting confectioner, Authority is what it matters most.

Elector Counts

The different provinces of the empire could either be conquered as normal, or they can be confederated which is the way to play the empire campaign. Either ways once taken control of, one of your generals can be assigned as the elector count of the province, then you can claim the rewards of the province. It is important to keep in mind however, that Sylvanian provinces can only be conquered since they are under the control of Vlad von Carstein. As for Wasteland, it can be conquered, or confederated through improving relations with them since they do not have Fealty either. The best course of action has to be taken according to the situation, it is a sandbox experience after all.

Reikland Early Game

The early game playing as Reikland has to be aggressive in order to avoid any Authority related problems, thus it is really important to take care for Khazrak and Festus as quickly as possible. Another important thing that players tend to oversee is the end turn resource and prestige availability. It is crucial to have either 2000 Gold available, or 1000 Prestige at the end of every turn, since they will be used to interact with the random events that could pops up at the start of the following turn. Those events will grant the player the option to spend those resources to improve Fealty with one of the elector counts, otherwise there will be penalties instead.

Altdorf Early Infrastructure

Altdorf the capital city of Reikland starts with a training field building, which many players tend destroy at the end of their first turn. This however, is a mistake. The building should be preserved and levelled up to a rally field which will grant the recruitment of Crossbowmen, and Halberdiers.

Altdorf Early Buildings

So after upgrading Altdorf to a village, it is ideal to build to following buildings for the following reasons:

• Rally Field: Allow recruitment of Crossbowmen unit. This unit is much better than Archers especially when fighting the Worriers of Chaos, since it has more range, and more armour piercing damage.
• Blacksmith: Not only will it allow the recruitment of Halberdiers unit, which excel at countering large target, and has a decent armour piercing damage. But this building will also grant an additional training slot in the province, hence allow recruitment of a full stack much faster.
• Clay Pit: Even though it grants less gold if compared with the Weaving House, this building grants Pottery resource production. This resource will ease the establishment of trade partners, hence it will pave the road for future alliances.

Diplomacy for Reikland

At the very start of Reikland campaign, it is very important to keep in mind that all the order factions are potential allies. Thus it is important to forge alliances with all the Elector counts that have fealty towards you, and the Bretonnian since they will be a decent ally fighting the Norscan enemies. Also it is key to keep the Dwarfs alive, it is even advised to gift them some settlements in the mountain areas since they will be a reliable ally against the Greenskins. Cathay is exempted from early alliances, more details in Economy section.

Technology

Choosing the right technologies will often lead to a better and smoother campaign. Thus it is ideal to start with the Tithe Rebates as the first technology to research, then go all the way towards the Imperial Architects. The different technologies, and the bonuses they provide are as follow:

• Tithe Rebates: +10 Growth, +2 Control
• Assembly Line: +10% Income from Industry
• Engineer’s Guild: +10% Research rate
• Continuous Production: +5% Income from Industry, -10% Cost for all buildings
• Guildmaster Professors: +15% income from Iron, Gem and Gold Mines
• Imperial Architects:  -25% Construction time for all buildings

All those bonuses will grant a decent boost to economy, a faster development to provinces, and an improvement to public order.

Expanding Reikland Empire

Expanding Reikland is tricky due to the fact the Khazrak, and Festus are now wandering around razing a pillaging the different Elector Counts around them. The havoc they are creating will cause Authority penalties, and could even lead to civil war in the Empire. Thus it is crucial to be aggressive, and to priorities eliminating these two factions before anyone else. To do that however, the province of Reikland needs to be consolidated early on. Even Helmgart needs to be captured, and the Empire Secessionists needs to be eliminated real quick.

Consolidating Reikland

To Consolidate Reikland, simply follow these steps:

• Turn 1: Recruit a Huntsman General, and garrison him in Altdorf. Then globally recruit 3 of Archers. On the other hand, send Karl Franz to take over Grunburg. Then locally recruit swordsmen into his army.
• Turn 2: Send Franz to the marked area, and keep recruiting into his army. Try to balance between range and melee troops.
• Turn 3: Send Franz to capture Ubersreik. Send the other lord to back him up while transferring recruited troops into Franz’s army.
• Turn 4: Here you can choose to either take over Fort Helmgart, or the city of Eilhart. Ideally it is better to keep hunting armies wherever they are recruited, to prevent the AI from having another stack of troops. This makes it easier to finish them off, and take over their settlement.
  
  

  Consolidating Reikland

Once done capturing your first province, and the fort of Helmgart, your focus should be to clear out the bigger threats ASAP.

Eliminating Khazrak the One-Eye

Kazrak the One-Eye leads the Warherd of the One-Eye. This is a Beastmen faction, a horde race which excels at hiding. Therefore it is very important to know how to deal with them early on, otherwise it will be very difficult to catch them. Hunting them will be tricky if players do not act fast. Ideally this faction should be taken out by turn 10, and it is not that hard to do so. However the key to finish them off is ambush. Thus having a weak army close to the main one is key as it will be used as bait.

Ambushing Khazrak

Khazrak is usually present around Weismund by turn 9~10. Therefore, the Ideal army has to be ready before then, and sent with a bait army to ambush Kazrak and take him off guard as seen in the photo above. Even if another AI army is present around, the AI will prioritize attacking the player due to the anti player bias. So simply place your weak army in a vulnerable position in the woods, and place your main army ahead of it in an ambush stance. Placing them in the woods will guarantee an ambush success, and thus the end of this faction. 

Destroying Festus the Leechlord

Once done with Kazrak, the next target has to be Festus the Leechlord as he is the most dangerous to the well being of the empire. The critical part here is the quality of the army, and its composition. More details about this later. Also it is ideal for Franz to have Lightning Strike ready by the time he reaches level 10.

Eliminating Festus

The main army should be enough to deal with this threat, therefore the other army has to be sent back to Reikland to defend it from any threat that could endanger the province. Following these steps will make an end to Festus no later than turn 15. This will give the option to choose your destination afterwards, yet the best course of action will be heading towards Vlad. He will be at war with numerous factions around him, which will be ideal to strip him off from his Drakenhof Castle. Once captured, you will be set to raise an additional army, and start rolling.

Reikland Economy

The Empire has a decent economy when compared to other factions, players simply need to build all related income buildings everywhere they can. This will yield the most income, thus hosting more armies, and upgrading provinces. Yet in the early game it could be tricky to keep up with all the events happening around.

Reikland Economy

Luckily, Altordf is on a fairly busy Catahian trade route. And since Cathay is far from you, it is not a bad idea to declare war on them in the early game to hunt down caravans and boost the economy. Therefore, the army sent back after defeating Khazrak to defend this province could also be used to hunt caravans and ameliorate the economy.

Reikland Army Composition

Army composition for the Empire is well rounded, thus it is ideal to build specialized armies to take down specific enemies. They unfortunately do not have the privilege of other races to simply spam a specific unit in an army and keep rolling. This however, is one of the things that makes this faction more enjoyable by players. It allows each player to build his own army composition, and enjoy the empire roster differently.

Reikland Army Composition

In the early game however, it is very important to build a reliable army, that helps you defeat your enemies fairly easy. The above photo shows a well rounded army for the early game. It will help finishing Khazrak, Festus, and even keep rolling toward Vlad.

All the steps in this guide will help you run a smooth campaign, and deal with whatever threat this game is to throw at you.

Note: This guide was tested on very hard difficulty settings for Campaign and Battle

Total War Warhammer III Beta is out, and Reikland is part of it!