Now I've tried 0.3 some.
I still got caught up in the summoning swamp
Only researched thau 1 and evo 3. My prince of death just walked around with his armies and couldn't cast a single spell.
I found that I didn't recruit any troops at all, so no gutter runners for me. I spent all my money on Warlords, moulders and castles and then new warlords (some occasional other commanders). I got myself indie commandes to move troops with (feels a bit silly, but it bugged me when I had to stop summoning units). I only used my warlords to move troops when i accidentally had too much chaff.
I thought I was invincible, but with 4 mighty AI's it became hard when Machaka attacked me with even more chaff. Fortunately I spawned troops faster then he got them to the front. But, then an unforseen problem emerged. Maintenance. With Machakas advance my own expansion stopped and my army still grew. I found myself unable to recruit commanders unless I alchemized. And my maintenance continued to grow (as did my army). I find myself unable to start a research, as I can't generate money, and I can't stop getting chaff that costs maintainance. I should get some plague censers and put my warlords in their midst.
The other balancing factor I discovered were the cave fortresses. In most provinces skaven build 1200 castles. Thats good. I still managed to get 5 new ones rather early, but it made my expansion somewhat slower. I built mainly in forests, as they got 800 hillforts there.
I entirely avoided censer bearers after I played a short game where my armies and commanders got annihilated by my own poison
. I got the doom-bell-hero in that game. Hoped he would become unequally obese, but no such luck
I got a most amazing assassin prophet, fat as Butterbean (he got himself the heroic obesity), Inberke by name. Eshin assassins are good, very good. They have higher att and def skills than most heroes and more than any recruitable unit I know of. Vanadrotdts got 14-16 right ? What will you do when you make dark elf assassins with WS9 ?
Eshin only has 6 IIRC.
I also find it a bit strange that the assassins can instill uprisnings.
At first I was ipressed with the skavenslaves and thought that they were the way to go, but I soon realized they they were chaff. The chieftains summoning is probably not an issue. Warlords might be (each warlord generates 32 gold each turn) as clanrats with falchions are quite useful. Since they have high AP they do not suffer that bad from routs (and they do rout).
Turn 36 or something (spring year 3):
6 forts (and one lost to machaka)
27 warlords - 108 clanrats generated
4 chieftains - ? skaven slaves
6 master moulder - 6 rat ogres
1 moulder - 4 giant rats
1 plague priest - 3 pestilence clan
1 Warlock
5 assassins
a handful of other commanders to move troops
Income 1169
Maintainance 876 and growing
Machakas Manticore with Blade Wind is my main concern atm.
BTW - skavenslaves are quite resistant to area attacks
. Only one of the three slaves get hit by each area attack.