Total War: WARHAMMER III | Empire Legendary Lords Guide
The best legendary lords for the Empire and an overview on them in Total War: WARHAMMER III
Game Guide by Arne on Jan 17, 2025
The Empire is a bastion of humanity and a bulwark against chaos. It brings rows of state troops armed with a variety of weapons to the battlefield. Overall, the Empireverall is in firepower and has ranged action. Despite this, it is fairly balanced and enjoys a selection of somewhat good units.
A lynchpin in the Empire's selection of Lords is their unique role, which most of these lords can't really be fulfilled by other units in their roster. With the DLCs, the Empire currently has access to five legendary lords, all of whom are great at what they do. There is also a unique lord and four generic lords to pick from.
Legendary Lords
The Legendary Lords in the game are always strong and powerful characters with many abilities and an expansive skill tree. They are also important figures in the lore and are the Lords you start within a campaign. Skirmish battles also remain some of the best options; however, they are very costly to field, so it is often preferred to take a generic lord instead.
Karl Franz
One of the premier characters in the world and certainly the most famous and most-played Legendary Lord. Karl Franz is a melee specialist and one of the best duelists in the game. He starts off with the attributes of Armored, Armor-Piercing, and Duelist. Armored lets him block damage from non-armor-piercing sources, and Armor-Piercing makes his attack ignore the armor of the target. This basically makes him very tanky and well-performing against armored enemies. Since most lords are armored, he excels against them.
His third attribute, duelist, makes him excel against heroes and lords. He isn't an assassin or roamer lord, however, as he relies on supporting units to avoid getting overwhelmed. He has the usual high HP, high leadership, and armor. His melee attack is lower than that of other lords, but this can be improved.
He also enjoys being around other units because he can buff them with various abilities. This includes his passives and any abilities received from his skill tree. One of his abilities, the Reikland Runefang, gives bonus leadership and melee attacks to nearby units, basically letting him hold on for longer.
If you have Ghal Maraz, on the other hand, you can deal massive amounts of damage quickly to a specific enemy, usually enemy lords and heroes. He still isn't great against hordes of enemies and should be reserved for very specific targets. This somewhat changes when he is mounted on Deathclaw. This gives him Fear & Terror, allowing him to rout them.
He will still lose against most of the stronger melee specialists in the game, like Tyrion with Sunfang or Skarbrand. His optimal use is still dealing with big threats that aren't with armor-piercing and anti-large [when mounted on Deathclaw]. He should generally try to keep himself safe from high damage of those types as he has no way of regenerating HP himself.
In the campaign, Karl Franz starts off by buffing Reiksguard but can be skilled to boost any unit. He has also become a great recruiter. He can also buff units to hold the line with the Reikland Runefang, making him a decent support lord, though that still isn't his specialty.
Balthasar Gelt
As the supreme patriarch will often let you know, he channels the power of Chammon, the wind of metal, to decimate enemies or support his armies. He has two distinct playstyles, but many of them are stringent on similar characteristics.
Balthasar Gelt is a great faction leader; heavily boosting the armor of all his troops and natural buffs to spellcasters means that you'll more than likely have one running around. He also boosts artillery units, and he has become a meme in the game.
Surprisingly, he is a decent melee combatant, with the ability to hold his own against a lot of other spellcaster lords or even some martial lords. However, he undoubtedly excels at the role of both support and damage dealer. Now, while he can do both at once, it is still far better for him to focus on one aspect.
His list of damage spells makes him a very big threat against large armies, with Searing Doom and Gehenna's Golden Hounds having relatively low cooldowns, making them very spammable when you have a good day with the winds of magic.
On the other hand, Final Transmutation takes a while to recharge and costs a lot of winds of magic; it deals absurd amounts of damage and is ideal when you're fighting the enemy head-on.
As a support specialist, he also becomes very powerful, being able to constantly buff your units and debuff the enemy ones. These spells include Glittering Robe, Plague of Rust, and Transmutation of Lead. The passive that triggers upon spell activation is also useful.
All of these require Gelt to be at many places at once, and thus, you should get him his unique mount, Quicksilver, as soon as you reach level 16. His speed on Quicksilver allows him to fly around enemies and dodge most lord-killers.
As for his army composition, Gelt should keep a high number of guns with a standard battle line of either steam tanks or spearmen. He should also avoid using any real cavalry or other wizards, as the former is incredibly weak under him, and the latter will be redundant as you will not have enough winds of magic for two spellcasters.
Volkmar the Grim
Volkmar the Grim is one of the more overlooked Legendary Lords of the Empire. He is underestimated and rightfully seen as the weakest of the Empire Legendary Lords. Despite this, he has an unmatched ability to bolster your units and allow something that no one lord can. Bring a strong frontline.
If you want units that can go toe-to-toe with the likes of Chosen and Chaos Warriors, you want Volkmar the Grim. As a character, Volkmar can ride his chariot, which gives him unbreakable, fear, terror, and a bunch more hit points. This, paired with his battle prayers and regeneration, allows him to also be the tankiest Empire Legendary Lord.
His main tool, at least in the campaign, is bringing a frontline of Flagellants. He gives them physical resistance and melee defense, making the zealots very hard to take down. Of course, Flagellants are meant to die, so you'll inevitably lose a lot of models. Luckily, he also increased the casualty replenishment rate for them, making it nigh impossible not to have a full unit of them ready for every battle.
His buffs to the infantry, along with the big area of effect Battle Prayers that he can get, can lead to a very strong or basically unbreakable frontline. Of course, none of his units will hit as hard, so you'll have to rely on a good composition of ranged and cavalry units.'
Markus Wulfhart
There is not much to say about Markus, as he is somewhat of a straightforward character. He is a ranged sniper with all the abilities needed to run around and hunt down enemy characters, be they lords or heroes.
In every battle, he gets two Focused Shots and three Hunter's Snares. These two abilities are what help him basically execute enemy lords very quickly. Hunter's Snare applies a sort of Net of Amyntok around foes in an area, trapping them, while a focused shot takes a long time to charge up and then hits the enemy for a lot of damage. This damage scales with how many hit points are missing. So you should first shoot the enemy lords for a while.
He has a long range and can fire and move, all the while having 360 degrees of firing range. This makes him good at kiting, along with his Hunter's Snare. That being said, he is very bad at melee, so if he gets caught by enemy units, he will lose eventually.
He buffs huntsmen and archers, so you should use them extensively. However, your composition should also have a few lynchpin units that can either hold the line or distract enemies.
Elspeth von Draken
The Dark Lady of Nuln, Elspeth von Draken, is a typical wizard with all the quirks and qualms you'd expect from one. She is very vulnerable and squishy until you unlock her dragon at level 16. Until then, use her like any other spellcaster. That being said, she can deal with a lot of enemy lords due to her Darkwalker ability, which gives her physical resistance and strider for 30 seconds.
You can pair it up early in the game with mortars, or you can unlock the Purple Sun to blob up enemy units and deal massive damage to their numbers. Due to unit weight, you might just get her stuck and quite easily killed, so you could also use an Empire Captain or a Warrior Priest for the role.
Like Gelt, she excels in the school of magic she specializes in and is even better when paired with another wizard. The best, in this case, would be either a Shadow or a Light Wizard.
When on her dragon, she can effectively deal with enemy units, bullying anything that comes in her path, except for strong anti-large units. The dragon also has a very useful breath attack that is best used on enemy heroes or single-entity units.
Overall, though, her strength comes in her ability to boost her lore of magic and use it in conjunction with the Empire's standard armies. This includes a line of spearmen with shields and a big gunline with ample artillery. Here, the Net of Amyntok from a Light Wizard is extremely useful, as are their buffs to frontline infantry.
Also, check our Total War: WARHAMMER III - Omens of Destruction Review and other guides on Total War: Warhammer III below:
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