The Ultimate Harvest (Throt the Unclean)
You can unlock Throt the Unclean’s final battle in your Total War: Warhammer II campaign by conquering at least three of Ariel’s waystone settlements noted on your HUD. While you could start the final battle in the Witchwood immediately after that, I would suggest building up your army first and grabbing the remaining settlements (there are six in total).
The Ultimate Harvest was probably one of the easiest final battles I’ve experienced in Total War: Warhammer II for a couple of reasons. For starters, I had already taken out all six of Ariel’s waystone settlements, significantly weakening her forces. The second reason was due to Throt the Unclean’s Flesh Laboratory mechanic. I had lots of high-end monster units with insane augments.
Arrayed against me were the armies of the Sisters of Twilight and various Wood Elves. They had a defensible position on a hill in the middle of the Witchwood and Ariel’s just there waiting.
Since we’re talking about elves, you can bet that they tried to pepper my units with arrows. Thankfully, my behemoths just shrugged off these projectiles. Plus, I had AI Skaven squads that were also rushing up to the sides of the hill. Ariel and the Wood Elves would get their flanks completely surrounded.
Given that the main objective was to defeat Ariel, it was possible to just ignore the Sisters of Twilight and other units. I actually just beelined for her with most of my top-tier troops (i.e., Hell Pit Abominations and Mutant Rat Ogres). Meanwhile, my faster units like Brood Horrors went for the melee and ranged infantry that guarded her.
When I saw that a lot of units were clustered together, I immediately unleashed multiple Warp Lightning Rods from the “Lobotomy” augment. This greatly damaged friend and foe alike (but, again, my monsters could take a lot of hits while the Wood Elves were flimsy).
Likewise, I used summoning spells from Throt, his Packmaster hero, and the general Skaven perk. I was able to swarm the treehuggers with Clanrats, Rat Ogres, and Wolf Rats, harassing enemy units before they could interfere.
After Ariel got chewed out, I was prompted to claim Ariel’s corpse. I believe this is done by having Throt get closer to where Ariel’s body is.
Then, I was tasked to make a break for it and retreat all the way back to the exit (the spawn point at the southern section of the map). Since Throt was already mounted on a Brood Horror, he (and everyone else) made a mad dash.
I saw a dialogue line saying that “very, very bad things” were arriving. However, the battle ended when Throt made it to the exit and I didn’t find out who these new opponents would be.
When I saw the battle results screen, I saw an army led by Drycha that’s part of Ariel’s forces, as well as another one of Drycha’s armies that was allied with Throt the Unclean. My only guess is that Drycha somehow plays a role during this encounter, but I’m uncertain of that. I didn’t prolong the fight at all.
Anyway, let’s take a look at the perspective of the Sisters of Twilight in their final battle in the Witchwood.
