Warhammer: Mark of Chaos - Battle March expands from the 2006 game
Warhammer: Mark of Chaos. The expansion adds the ability to control both Orcs and Dark Elves in the single player campaign and a new World Domination Mode in multiplayer. In the single player game, you will move to and from each scenario on rails via the overhead map. As you prepare to take on each scenario, you are provided the opportunity to both prepare your troops and choose the various types of troops you will need. These troops are your basic melee class, middle range, long range and tank groups. It just happens that here they are ground troops, spears, riflemen, and mounted units. Most of the time, you take this opportunity to train your troops and replenish your ranks. Once you have selected the troops you wish to use, you enter the field of battle.
Once you are in the battle, you are given time to place your troops where you want within the starting area. Now that you have positioned your troops where you want them, it is time to start the scenario. Here is where it kind of falls apart for me. For a game based on strategy and troop positioning, you have surprisingly limited options. You can toggle a few options that will affect the tightness of your grouping and your profile, but really that is about it. There is a legitimate reason for each of the formations, but it never actually really affects battle. You simply slowly move through the map and overwhelm the clumped groups of enemies that conveniently wait for you to get close enough to aggro and move in on you.
Besides your troops, you will have heroes on the field of battle. You are going to spend more of your time trying to keep them alive than the strategy of moving your troops around. Heroes have special abilities that have a huge impact on the battles. You can bolster morale, add speed to units, invisibility, increase damage output and defensive capabilities. All of this accomplished through the use of magic. You and your opponents will have equal magic pools to draw from, so some discretion and timing will be in order.
Controlling your troops is a simple matter of selecting the units and telling them where to go. It is no wonder this is being released on consoles as well. The practice of this was different than the intent. In the heat of battle, it was very difficult to get the units to respond and move where they directed. The good news is that you can play against 3 other people online who are all having the same trouble you are.
