History YMMV / TotalWar

* CrowningMomentOfAwesome: You are fully capable of pulling these off with your armies.

* GameBreaker: In ''Medieval II'', Elephants. The Russians may also qualify: while they start with the weakest roster of any faction (and a hard territory to conquer an control), any city of theirs with the Huge Stone Walls upgrade is able to build Cossack Musketeers, a top-tier gunpowder unit, the instant blackpowder weapons become available.
** In ''Shogun'', Legendary Geisha. Nearly invincible, can wipe out entire clans if strategized right. Essentially kunoichi.
*** Also in Shogun, Hojo clan's income bonus. Even a middling Hojo player could sweep the campaign map before the first European contact.
*** Kensai with decent Honour/Weapons/Armour can put down whole peasant rebellions, add a few to your uber-general's army and watch them carve everything up, excluding the Heavy Cavalry lead by heirs/Daimyos, Warrior Monks and high level Naginata Cavalry.
*** The Takeda clan will sometimes start with an heir who has Honour 5-6 in addition to their Daimyo with Honour 6.
** Arguably the Dismounted Feudal Knights are an early-game GameBreaker in ''Medieval II''. These powerhouse infantry units have insane defensive bonuses and are very effective in close combat as well. They're eventually countered by crossbows and gunpowder.
*** And in ''Medieval II'', the Scots have access to Noble Swordsmen, who are basically Dismounted Feudal Knights on steroids. Also, the Scots have Highland Nobles, which when fully upgraded cleave through most infantry and cavalry like a chainsaw through tapioca.
*** The Scots don't get high-end gunpowder units, and have relatively weak archery units. The reason for this is because when you've got 1,200 screaming, painted, claymore-swinging Highland Nobles charging you, ''no'' amount of arrows, cavalry, or gunpowder is going to save your ass. And cavalry are squished outright by the range of pikemen that the Scots can field. Timurid Elephants? Psh. Scottish infantry are some of the ''best'' in the game, especially on a charge, and are pretty cheap compared with most other factions' infantry. Pair Highland Nobles with some Noble Swordsman for shock attacks and a bunch of pikemen to ward off cavalry or accept countercharges, and you'll destroy nearly everything.
*** The ''Stainless Steel'' mod for Medieval II manages to make the Scots even ''more'' broken. The Highland Nobles are nerfed (though still powerful, it becomes much harder to recruit them) but in turn makes recruiting pikemen even easier, so most Scottish armies are going to be packing at least four to ten units of pikemen. And, just like they were historically, pikemen are ''powerful'', particularly thanks to the combat system. Every time a soldier takes a hit from a weapon that doesn't penetrate their armor, they have a brief "flinching" animation that either stops them from advancing or prevents them from attacking. Pikemen, thanks to their long pikes, inflict these "flinching" animations well before an opponent can get into striking range, and three or four men at least are going to be poking every enemy soldier, thanks to the pikes' reach. This dramatically slows them down and makes it hard to attack them ([[TruthInTelevision just like it did historically]]) and with hordes of pikes poking them, even heavy infantry will eventually go down, and the small size of a cavalry unit compared to the pike unit ensures that every cavalryman is getting stabbed by dozens of pikes at a time. But the real kicker comes from the fact that Scotland is based on the British Isles, and all castles in the British Isles, once upgraded with the right archery ranges, can produce longbowmen. Pikes + longbows = nearly unbreakable formations that render just about any form of cavalry into a sad joke. Even missile cavalry are largely useless against this formation, as the longbowmen generally out-range them, outnumber them, and have better bows. So, instead of the Scottish armies in vanilla Medieval, which are a powerful infantry-oriented force that can destroy anything on a charge, you instead get a nearly-invincible Scottish army with unbreakable pike-and-shot formations, about three hundred years before widespread firearms use resulted in its development historically.
*** Think Highland Nobles and Noble Swordsmen are bad? Try the Moors Dismounted Christian Guard unit. Sure, you don't get them until late in the game and all the other infantry the Moors can field are mediocre, but their baseline stats of 16 attack and 22 defense, low upkeep and good morale and stamina more than make up for it. The Moors also get Camel Gunners, which are essentially mounted musketeers, and start off close to Timbuktu, where a few merchants can make several thousand florins per turn.
** Horse Archers in Rome. They're practically impossible to catch with cavalry (and a clever player can simply support them with some melee cavalry) and can easily manoeuvre themselves behind enemy infantry units where they don't have their shields for protection. The only thing they need to be wary of are foot archers. The Cliblinarii of the expansion are even worse in that they're ''tough'' horse archers. Cliblinarii immortals are quite capable of mauling their way through ''several units of opposing Roman soldiers''. Spears are no refuge from these armoured nightmares.
** Also in Rome...MOTHER. FUCKING. CHARIOTS. Any army that can use them will flood their armies with them. Hope you enjoy watching in screaming frustration as they drive full-pelt into your units, running them over and causing them to run merely seconds after hitting!
** Also in Rome, Roman legionaries set to autofire. No, seriously.
** Another for Rome, selecting a city and typing "oliphaunt" into the romeshell produced an elephant unit that could win most any battle with enough of them (they had to be auto resolved, otherwise they took no casualties but took ages to kill anyone).
** In the ''Americas'' expansion for ''Medieval II'', New Spain starts out with both Hernan Cortez ''and'' a couple of culverin artillery pieces. The culverin is able to pretty much one-shot any tower, wall, or gate and can blow massive, gaping holes in enemy regiments, and the native population has ''no'' possible counter. Hernan, meanwhile, is a ridiculously tough cavalry bodyguard who starts out with eight Command stars that only go up, and provides an immense morale bonus on top of that. In other words, Cortez can practically conquer most of the Aztec empire right off the bat with only his single army stack.
*** [[TruthInTelevision Which is not too far from what happened in real life]].
** One of the more popular total conversion [[GameMod mods]] is ''Third Age Total War.'' This is Medieval II Total War meets TheLordOfTheRings. The modders have generally done an excellent job of implementing and balancing widely different factions. There are, however, some glaring exceptions that make sense in the lore but are still murder:
*** Dwarves are notoriously heavily armored and dangerous in melee. Meaning you can't use arrows ''or'' infantry against them effectively. They're slow but seeing as how most TotalWar combat revolves around city sieges...
*** The High Elves can recruit an "archer" that not only has the longest range in the game and fires arrows which can kill most heavy infantry units through their shields, ''it has armor and a melee attack greater than most infantry and can run alongside fast cavalry.'' You're tempted to scream at the cocky Noldar elves as cheap enemy infantry surge in on your very expensive, difficult to recruit archers. That impulse goes away after the first time they butcher and rout the orcs that hit their lines and then merrily execute the fleeing survivors with arrows to the back.
*** The Silvan Elves as a whole. Even their basic Light Elven Archers have range and firepower comparable to most other factions' best archers, and the Sentinels that are their second-level archers are both excessively long-ranged, hit hard, and have excellent melee capabilities as well. Because of the versatility of their archers, it is possible to have the lion's share of any Silvan army be made up of Light and Sentinel archers, which will utterly butcher any army trying to charge them. Sure, their melee infantry aren't that great, but when 75% of the enemy army is already dead by the time the lines meet, and the archers are just as good fighters as the dedicated melee troops, they don't ''need'' to be. It's possible to destroy an entire enemy army that outnumbers yours two or even three to one, with trolls and wargs, while only taking a couple hundred casualties at most. Hell, the Silvans' ranged capability is so great that they can siege and assault small fortresses and villages ''without setting foot inside them''.
*** The only thing that beats the above archers are trolls. Which will beat them with absolutely no effort or direction from the player. If you see trolls on the other side regardless of what your faction or army composition is, resign yourself to losing 300 men off the top. Oh, and trolls are also as fast as cavalry and can even [[BeyondTheImpossible climb siege ladders]] because they are coded as infantry.
** The ''Thera: Legacy of the Great Torment'' mod has one of these in the form of the Uruk Dominion. The Uruk-Hai (which are pretty much exactly like the ones from the ''Third Age: Total War'' mod) are given some truly terrifying stats, including high attack, high armor, and two hitpoints each. Essentially, they're an infantry version of a General's Bodyguard that doesn't suffer penalties like cavalry in sustained combat. Watch in horror (or glee, if you're controlling them) as they charge an entire stack's worth of elite heavy infantry and archers and go right through their arrows to crush the infantry without stopping. And heaven forbid they assault a city or castle, because streetfighting is where the Uruk-Hai troops ''excel''. Fortunately, they're still vulnerable to cavalry, gunpowder, and siege weaponry, and sieges drain their numbers if they're on the defensive.
** In ''Medieval II'', any Islamic faction's imam can call a jihad if he has 4+ piety. In other words if you have any reasonably competent imam, you can call jihads every ten turns or so. Massive, free upkeep army with major bonuses, access to religious mercenaries for almost no cost, and can scream across land faster than ships can sail, and available ''on demand''? Yes, ''please''.
** A pretty bad example of this is when you are playing as the Moors. You begin with a Imam that can immediately call a Jihad after building up a small army of 8 Units, and after hiring a bunch of Jihadist mercenaries, you can effectively destroy either spain or portugal by blitzing their inexperienced and lightly spread out forces and capturing their only 2 settlements. Wait ten more turns, then you can take out the other faction, and you immediately have control of the Iberian peninsula and your home in North Africa.
*** The downside is that you can only declare Jihad on former Muslim lands that have been conquered by other factions so it's not ''too'' powerful unless you're on the ropes, or as has been said only aim to conquer Spain. However, Crusades can target any large, non-Christian city. An army on the Crusade has no upkeep and can recruit lots of excellent, cheap mercs. You can have as many crusading stacks as you have generals. The downside is that the army *must* move towards the crusade target every turn or it starts deserting in droves. The catch here is that it doesn't matter whether you close in fast or slow, only that your army ends turn closer to the target than it was, even if it's only one square. Which means that as say, the French, you can declare a Crusade on Moscow and pretty much rape all of Europe and the Balkans with nigh unlimited, free, fast and overpowered armies.
** Cavalry in Medieval II against ''everything else.'' Well, everything else in the early period anyway. It is possible to completely eradicate entire armies on Very Hard with just two units of generals bodyguard, properly applied. This includes armies with ''other, weaker, knights.'' Watch units of spear militia, the supposed counter to the cavalry of the early period, get smashed aside by your bodyguards with few losses. Cavalry are a lot more expensive, but it still doesn't reflect their awe inspiring power.
*** This is so bad that using large amounts of cavalry, or even worse, using cavalry almost to the exclusion of everything else, will earn you dirty looks in multiplayer. The first thing an incoming newbie learns about Medieval II multiplayer is to ask about the policy with cavalry; usually the limit is six horse, up to two of which can be horse archers.
** Don't forget the "Old Guard" form "Napoleon: Total War". These guys may be expensive and late game but they can make entire enemy formations break and run in fear based on their mere presence on the battlefield. Inspiring fear abillity combined with inspires friendly troops and ludicrously high stats make this one of the most feared units in the game. Used wisley one squad of these guys can break an enemy flank and change the tide of battle.
** In ''Empire'' and ''Napoleon'', Frigates are this. The main reason is that ArtificialStupidity prevents the AI from being able to organize a trap or a proper chase. This allows the various Frigates (which are notably faster than most ships, while still reasonably-armed) to lead enemy ships on a chase throughout the entire battlemap, while constantly turning to bombard the nearest chaser and then turning away to widen the gap again. This is similar to Horse Archer tactics in previous games - fire at the enemy and retreat to a safe distance, over and over. Moreover, if any enemy ship is fast enough to chase you properly, the AI gets even more confused and will usually run right into your Chain-Shot range (at which point a single volley will usually slow them to a crawl for the rest of the battle). Since in Naval Combat your ammunition is unlimited, you can continue doing this as long as you have time left on the clock (and that can be set to "infinite"). Also, this tactic works best when you only use one single ship (reducing micromanagement to a minimum). You can take on pretty much any fleet with a single Frigate this way. And then you research 38-gun Steam Ships...

** To be fair the same thing would happen in Rome: Total War without exception, and sometimes Medieval II and Empire; at least they came up with a slightly valid excuse this time round.

*** The ''Stainless Steel'' mod for Medieval II manages to make the Scots even ''more'' broken. The Highland Nobles are nerfed (though still powerful, it becomes much harder to recruit them) but in turn makes recruiting pikemen even easier, so most Scottish armies are going to be packing at least four to ten units of pikemen. And, just like they were historically, pikemen are ''powerful''. But the real kicker comes from the fact that Scotland is based on the British Isles, and all castles in the British Isles, once upgraded with the right archery ranges, can produce longbowmen. Pikes + longbows = nearly unbreakable formations that render just about any form of cavalry into a sad joke. Even missile cavalry are largely useless against this formation, as the longbowmen generally out-range them, outnumber them, and have better bows. So, instead of the Scottish armies in vanilla Medieval, which are a powerful infantry-oriented force that can destroy anything on a charge, you instead get a nearly-invincible Scottish army with unbreakable pike-and-shot formations, about three hundred years before widespread firearms use resulted in its development historically.

** Horse Archers in Rome. They're practically impossible to catch with cavalry (and a clever player can simply support them with some melee cavalry) and can easily manoeuvre themselves behind enemy infantry units where they don't have their shields for protection. The only thing they need to be wary of are foot archers.

** Which leads to a bit of FridgeHorror. Every action you take has the possibility to irreversibly change world history, for better or for worse. Say for instance, you are playing ''Napolean'' as the British, and you lose your fleet. This causes a chain reaction of events. France then invades Britain, which no longer has a fleet to defend it. France wins the war of the Sixth Coalition due to Britain's absence. France colonizes the world, becomes a superpower, Etc, Nous avons cette conversation en français. See, one slip up can potentially cause disaster in more ways than one!

** Which leads to a bit of FridgeHorror. Every Action you take has the possibility to irreversibly Change world history, for better or for worse. Say For Instance, You are Playing NTW as the British, and you lose your fleet. This causes a Chain reaction of events. France Then Invades Britain, which no longer has a fleet to defend it. France wins the war of the Sixth Coalition due to Britain's Absence. France Colonizes The World, Becomes an Superpower, Et, Nous avons cette conversation en français. See, One Slip up can potentially cause disaster in more ways than one!

* HistoricalHeroUpgrade: George Washington (the classic example) in the "Road to Independence" campaign in Empire.

** Which leads to a bit of FridgeHorror. Every Action you take has the possibility to irreversibly Change world history, for better or for worse. Say For Instance, You are Playing NTW as the British, and you lose your fleet. This causes a Chain reaction of events. France Then Invades Britain, which no longer has a fleet to defend it. France wins the war of the Sixth Coalition due to Britain's Absence. France Colonizes The World, Becomes an Superpower, Et, Nous avons cette conversation en français. See, One Slip up can potentially cause disaster in more ways than one!
* UnpleasableFanbase: You might get this impression from browsing around on forums such as TWCenter, though the recent patch has been given mostly positive reviews by fans, and ''Napoleon: Total War'' got many positive reviews... only to lead to further disappointment at seeing what ''Empire'' could or should have been, especially because many of the improvements of ''Napoleon'' couldn't be "rolled back" into ''Empire'', i.e. through future patches. The narrowed scope of ''Napoleon'' both geographically and chronologically, and a decreased emphasis on navies and trade (the trade slots are mostly on the edges of the map, and many of them geographically to Great Britain's advantage), was also disappointing to some.
* YourMileageMayVary : Shogun and the first Medieval are held in high regard, although there were even a few complaints about the latter from the original fans. But starting from Rome, a complains araised regarding historical historical inaccuracy,(see the [[AnachronismStew Egyptians above]])poor AI (even compared to Shogun and Medieval) and a plethora of bugs. Fortunately the games' dedicated mod community allowed players to fix many of those problems by themselves eventually. However more recently, ''Empire'' was criticized for [[ObviousBeta the large number of bugs and AI flaws it suffered from on release day]] and the severely limited modding options compared to the previous games.

* ScrappyMechanic: Surpisingly enough for a series this long, there really aren't that many. There is one that mars what is otherwise a brilliant game, Shogun 2. "Realm Divide" basically has Japan ally up and split into two sides when you reach about 15 provinces or so (Out of about 80). These sides consist of you, and the other side consists of everyone else in Japan, [[ChronicBackstabbingDisorder including clans who have been allies with you for years.]] If you don't think that's unfair enough... each clan arrayed against you is [[TheComputerIsACheatingBastard given multiple gigantic stacks of veteran units every turn.]]

* {{Narm}}: ''Rome'''s announcer doesn't really seem suited to the job, especially when he yells "The day is ours!"

-->"They say the French are better lovers than fighters. This is true. Ask any pig, cow, or other barnyard animal!"

* In ''Empire'' and ''Napoleon'', Frigates are this. The main reason is that ArtificialStupidity prevents the AI from being able to organize a trap or a proper chase. This allows the various Frigates (which are notably faster than most ships, while still reasonably-armed) to lead enemy ships on a chase throughout the entire battlemap, while constantly turning to bombard the nearest chaser and then turning away to widen the gap again. This is similar to Horse Archer tactics in previous games - fire at the enemy and retreat to a safe distance, over and over. Moreover, if any enemy ship is fast enough to chase you properly, the AI gets even more confused and will usually run right into your Chain-Shot range (at which point a single volley will usually slow them to a crawl for the rest of the battle). Since in Naval Combat your ammunition is unlimited, you can continue doing this as long as you have time left on the clock (and that can be set to "infinite"). Also, this tactic works best when you only use one single ship (reducing micromanagement to a minimum). You can take on pretty much any fleet with a single Frigate this way. And then you research 38-gun Steam Ships...

*** Averted in ''Empire'' and ''Napoleon'', where looting a city results in massive happiness penalties that could easily spark a revolt within a couple of turns unless you cut taxes and fill the city with militia/dragoons. Especially true when taking the massive major faction capitals (Paris, London, Moscow, etc.).