Warhammer: Mark of Chaos - Empire Campaign - Chapter 1, Mission 1

Here are general tips for playing the Empire Campaign in Warhammer: Mark of Chaos on HARD Difficulty. A list of all our Warhammer: Mark of Chaos articles can be found here.
We won't be hand-holding you through absolutely everything, but instead just give tips on situations that we found tricky or that you might not have considered.

Chapter 1: The Call of War

Mission 1: Tower of Darkness

Overview

• Straightfoward mission, but trickier if you want to get through with no losses whatsoever. Unlike the Chaos Campaign, you do not have easy access to unit resurrection. Remember that our walkthroughs use Hard difficulty and unless stated we DO NOT rely on potions or other one-use items.
• After this mission, do not go crazy spending the little money you have.
• E.g., Since handgunners are going to win your fights for you, give them the best weapons. And since you are putting units in front of them to draw fire, for now do not armour them.
• As you continue forward with Chapter 1, keep in mind that you may need about 15,000 gold to outfit the elves after Chapter 2, Mission 2.
• You will get a Bright Wizard after this mission. I recommend aiming for Fireball and Spell Focus to pump out a lot of effective fireballs. There is no friendly fire associated with it, so it is a very good spell.
• If you insist on tanking with Swordsmen or some other melee unit, then you could build up the Flaming Shield of Andor and continue with the enhancements that make the protected unit dangerous to approach. However, since we prefer to aim for zero unit losses, we arranged our units with the Captain up front and the Wizard slightly behind for early fire support and emergency support.
• If Von Kessel is going to take point (and he can get a high armour rating quickly that he can do so comfortably), move the magic ring from the Bright Wizard to him.

Walkthrough

Fight 1: Marauders

• Sit tight and let them approach. Volley them with handgunners before turning on armour buffs and engaging with front line of swordsmen.
• It's okay to use the swordsmen armour buff because we are relying on the two regiments of handgunners to do most of our killing anyway.

Fight 2: Marauders and Axe Throwers

• Unfortunately, these regiments are close enough that they will move together so we can't pull them to engage them one at a time.
• There's no time limit, so wait for your handgunners to finish the cooldown on their Volley ability. You can use one or both here, but you'll probably want to save at least one for later.
• It's a bit tricky, but send Von Kessel ahead ALONE, at the Axe Throwers. Once he gets their attention, turn on Armour of Contempt for an additional +2 to Armour rating.
• Now that Von Kessel is ahead, the Marauders will probably swing around to attack him because he is closer. Turn Von Kessel around to attack them. Use Storm of Steel to help.
• When you turn Von Kessel around, the Axe Throwers will be able to shoot again. This is fine for now since we just don't want them to freely throw at our regiments, who have 1 HP a piece and we could lose a few models to the barrage.
• While Von Kessel is moving up, send the three regiments to back him up as long as it looks like the Marauders are committed to attacking the Captain.
• The swordsmen should hit the Marauders from behind and hopefully between them and the handgunners, finish them off before Von Kessel is dead.
• Turn on the swordsmen armour buff because the Marauders will probably turn their attention to the swordsmen.
• You can try the line formation on the handgunners since that seems to arrange them more quickly (so they can fire sooner) than the default row formation.
• Finally, mop up the Axe Throwers. As soon as any melee unit (whole regiment or just one model, like a lone hero) engages a shooting regiment, the entire regiment stops shooting. Note that just being in melee distance does not count as engaging -- a regiment must be attacking with hand-to-hand combat in order to stop a regiment from shooting.

Fight 3: Rescue the Bright Wizard

• Once Fight #2 is finished, assemble and head down immediately to reinforce the Bright Lord.
• The Bright Lord can last a while, but you still want to hurry because we need to take advantage of that. The sooner we can take pressure off him, the more HP he will have to tank for our regiments.
• Don't put any regiment in the tower as it is too far to be useful later.
• March up your regiment fairly close to the Bright Wizard but do not engage with the swordsmen. Let the handgunners volley and kill most of them before sending in Von Kessel and the Swordsmen.
• It's nice to use the volleys here instead of in Fight 2 because the sooner you can clear the Marauders, the sooner you can charge the Axe Throwers. If the Axe Throwers advance while you are still entangled with the Marauders, getting Von Kessel to intercept them might cause him to take a couple of hits while pushing through the Marauders.
• Once the Axe Throwers start moving, you need to intercept them before they get too many throws. Have Von Kessel take point and turn on Armour of Contempt. He is probably injured from the previous fight so you need to support him.
• Once the Marauders near the Bright Lord are gone, just direct everyone to attack the Axe Throwers. When the Swordsmen get close, turn on their armour buff as well and just attack.

With a bit of luck, you should be able to get through this mission with 0 losses. At this early stage it's not a big deal to lose a few models, but we will always try to finish missions with no net losses.