Which is the worst faction now? Tarth or Gilden?

When played by the AI Gilden usually has twice the faction power as other AIs and Tarth is either among the weakest or dead. That says a lot.

Gilden is pretty meh but they have no real weaknesses. Golems could use a buff but other then that they get some good units with special blunt weapons that are cheap to upgrade. Their blood is amongst the best as it boosts hp and spell resistance.

Tarth has the very noticeable unrest penalty and has 2 points in Stealth and Scouts. I don't think the AI uses these abilities well at all and even for players they don;t come close to half off your units. The bows are nice though.

Gilden isn't too bad, Golems are pretty much resource expensive door stops though.  New Pariden is pretty crappy too, but has a few tricks that it can exploit for AI and Players.  I really need to play Tarth, as I am not sure how their racial attack stacks up, but their small unit bonus is worthless.  And I have never found their stealth to be very good, although I know a lot of people thought it was OP.  

Yeah stealth is basically useless.

Imho it should allow for settlements besides dragonhoards or just evil creatures in general.

Even now Units(!) still get attacked because they are supposedly "in the way".

Tarth is a really bad race.

Earth magic is one of the best tactical schools, which I think Gilden's leader gets.  However, 50% more for tactical spells makes it SOOOO expensive -- I hate that  two of the light side earth magic champs get ironeer blood.  Keep hoping to get Inslow.  

Haste / slow and cost like 2-3 mana with mantle of oceans,  yet diamond skin costs like 86; giant form 28....., with a ironeer caster

Not sure the AI suffers for this though, since the AI has no clue how to use spells like diamond skin, fracture, etc...  Never seen AI use them.  Tremor is strategic and great for locking down armies, but also never seen the AI try to lock down my army.   That would raise the difficulty ten fold if AI could figure out how to use its spellbook. 

I don't understand. In my experience, Gilden is so overpowered as an AI opponent it's almost unfair.

-higher hp

-higher spell resistance

-Lower armor cost

-Higher armor defense

-OFFSET BY higher mana cost for spells the AI rarely uses

God forbid you fight against Gilden on expert or higher. They have their +1hp per level and the hp bonus, with all their troops wearing low-cost plate mail. 

A custom ironeer race with the "Warlord" trait on its sovereign might be even better.

Tarth never seems to do well in AI hands...but sure seems OP in player hands. Early game, Tarth has huge advantages.

Tarth is an early game powerhouse that is able to unvover and settle the map very quickly with the stealth/master scouts trait and can snipe monsters with their 3-man ranged armies utilizing their blood trait. As an offset they have to deal with increased unrest and have to watch out that they don't fall behind midgame research- and productionwise. They are basically wood elves.

Gilden are the slow but mighty faction that starts off pretty standard, their advantages kick in midgame when they can utilize their vast defences and their heavy golems. If they make it to the late game, they are able to create high-defence/high hit-points troops that are difficult to wittle down. They are basically dwarves. 

It may very well be that you think Tarth or Gilden have useless traits for you playstyle or are boring to play, but they are not at all if you like their "culture" and know how to utilize their strengths.

How does Magnat's faction stand up as a stock faction?

Magnar is the zerg overlord. Very powerful early game, able to throw cheap slave troops at everything, but also kinda frail. Even though faction/sovereign differentiation is already quite good, Quendar race would be the one that needed some more flavour the most. +50% fire resistance and -50% ice resistance is not really worthwhile.

Ditto indeed, both these two races suits me fine.

Agreed. Gilden needs better Golems to become more competitive. Gilden also needs MORE types of golems to spice up their gameplay. A quick read through a D&D manual (not to courage copyright enfringement) would show that a variety of golems is available if effort were made. Clay Golem, Stone Golem, Iron Golem, Bone Golem....possibilities exist.

As for Tarth, they used to be the strongest faction to play in FE. Has this swarm mechanic really hamstringed Tarth that much? Maybe Tarth should be given a bonus when attacking into a swarm line? (since they are expected to have so few in number)

I don't really see how Gilden is not competitive. Sure, you can always add more types of golems to spice up their gameplay, but even if golems were to be completely removed, Gilden as a faction would still be pretty damn strong, because their focus is on outfitting and upgrading their regular troops.

Tarth are extremely strong early game and don't need the swarm trait for their archers.

I feel like there are a lot of cool abilities in LH, but many of these are too cost prohibitive to utilize effectively. Level up traits are too slow to obtain, many spells cost way too much mana, upgrading equipment for troops/heroes is really expensive, etc. I understand there needs to be a cost associated for balance, but what good does it do me to offer spell books of any type in my shop if I can never afford to buy them for my heroes? (as an example)

What..?  Gilden is one of the strongest factions, imo, and were by far my easiest win out of my 6 games (conquest victory is the only way I play.)  In fact, I would say they are the single strongest, as the Life tree is by far the best for the way this game plays, and Gilden gets it from the start on top of everything else (Fire would seem to make a lot more sense thematically, but w/e) - though Pariden was a close second.

I would say the wraith faction is definately the weakest, from their lack of healing, and due to unavailablity of the "design heavy mounted troops with the best spears you have researched and all the initiative artifacts and perks, cast Heart of Fire and the Initiative enchant on high essence Fortress, support with a few mage units (which are far more effective than any real spells), enjoy wiping everything off the map in 2 turns or less" that all the other factions devolve into.  Quite disappointing, really - the way Heart of Fire works and the fact that the AI is too dumb to stack initiative makes the way games play out extremely repetitive and lackluster.  

Tarth is bad from a different perspective, imo - they aren't really that much different than anyone else.  Their archers don't come any earlier and are just a tiny bit stronger than normal - and that's pretty much it for them as a faction, aside from their scout bonus, which is sort of nice while expanding, and staffmages are far stronger than any archers no matter how you slice it.  I can tell you that plinking things for 5-6 damage for most of the game if you try to level your sovereign as an archer is pretty disappointing, but mage champions aren't really much better off in tactical with the weakness of combat spells aside from Heal, Graveseal, and Haste/Slow, and at least the Tarth sov gets Heal.   In general, I find the faction differences in this game quite disappointing, especially considering Kael is working on the game - as I said, no matter who you are, you end up with the same exact units/strategy, and that strategy just happens to be what Gilden is designed for.

The Gilden golems are great for cheap (crystalwise) city defenders, btw.  If you really want to take advantage of the faction, make your main unit-spewing Fortress on any tile with 3+ essense, regardless of other stats - use Gentle Rain to get city levels (OP spell) and the enchants I mentioned (Heart of Fire and the Air initiative enchantment), plus the HP/Def ones if you can fit them, to buff your units astronomically.  Of course, this strategy is the same one everyone uses, but Gilden's tougher units get even more of a benefit.

While I agree that you can always go much further when it comes to faction differentiation (at the expense of game balance) and I would like to see more along the line, I don't agree that every faction basically plays the same. Tarth bows will let you create pretty different units than Gilden plate armor and Ythril two-handed axes, which means that every faction has different research goals. You can play it like Gilden with another faction, but you won't be as sucessful if you do.

The real issue is that the AI has to understand the differences and that the equipment/traits/spells have to be balanced.

The Mancers are really, really good now. Capitar is suited to build up a strong economy early, and crank out an army. Then their mobility in moving troops is unmatched. Make enough roads and you can out maneuver Tarth.  

None of the factions suck, in my opinion. If you really understand their strengths and play them well, they can win. 

Though as of .87, I bet the wraiths really miss their dodge bonus from wargs. 

One thing I'd grown to like about Wraiths is their inherent Steal Life skill.  Once your troops have hit around level 6+, Steal Life becomes pretty handy.

Would also agree Golems need some love.  I was wondering why they don't have an inherent Crushing Blow skill seeing as they don't get to equip weapons like Juggernauts do?

Gilden is one of the best factions in the hands of the AI.  I don't know how great they are for players since I only play as custom factions, but they're always in the top 2 in the games I play (and I run 10 AI opponents).  Them and the Ythril, or whatever they're called.  The gray guys.  I've never seen Tarth near the top, though.  

In MadDjinn last Mancer Let's Play, Tarth is actually on top of the list beneath a custom faction of his and himself. I do not know how they managed that, but my guess is luck. Pure sheer luck.

Gilden AI is usually pretty strong. guess that's to some extent because most of their bonuses are fail-safe. a passive 25% extra armor from the sov, a passive +1 HP per level and +30 spell resistance for troops and cheaper armor production and upgrades - there's really nothing specific that the AI has to actively use to make them powerful, it's just passive boosts to things they do anyway. Tarth AI is a gamble. if they make it to the archery techs without falling behind, they have a good chance of becoming quite powerful. if they are too slow, they can never catch up later.

the worst Ai in my games is often Magnar. AI loves to waste the potential power of their sov by making him a commander or assassin instead of the obvious choice, and they love to waste their production/resources building crappy slave units with bows or heavy armor (lol @ 8 initiative slave archers or 11 initiative slave axemen in full chain armor)

I have to agree now about Tarth.  Now that double strike is working as intended following the latest patch, the Tarth faction bonuses seem pretty weak compared to other factions.  While double strike can become an amazing skill for assassin heroes specializing in accuracy, it's very weak--basically unusable--early on.  Your units will generally just whiff and waste an attack. 

Couple this with another faction trait that becomes very poor late game (the 3 units or less attack bonus) and you have another trait that adds little to the faction.  Nobody in their right mind really wants to be running around the map with 3 units or less late in the game.  This should be scrapped entirely and replaced with a different bonus.

I just thought I would point out that after playing the game as Tarth, and giving them my units to use, they have become practically invincible.  If you give them the Precision and initiate perks/charms they almost always hit their double strikes it seems, and, since I tend to only have 1 or 2 real armies, it's impossible to get through all their archer chaff without getting hurt too badly to do anything about it.  Lost 2 games in a row now to Tarth with my units (ridiculous AI)

Perhaps their unit design should just be adjusted some