To preface things, I have a very hard time finding headsets that don't feel like a vicegrip upon my head, and while I'm toughing out some HyperX Stinger (first version) that are falling apart at the seams I still need a good replacement.

So what do I need? Let me tell you in (rough) order of importance.

1) Swiveling Ears: In my own experience, that's the best thing for me to avoid major headaches due to the headset pushing too hard against my head. Left to Right seems more important than Up to Down, and I'm open to other ideas to let the headsets adjust better.

2) Metal/Flexible Headband: Part of what made the Stinger work for me was its metal headband, which allowed it to get much wider than its normal shape due to the metal's flexibility. I'm not entirely against plastic headbands, but the clamping force either needs to be minimal, or you need to be pretty confident they won't just snap if widened.

3) Price: Ultimately, the cheaper the better, as long as I can get something that isn't actively uncomfortable. I'm not a big audiophile, not do I care about thorough soundproofing. I'd rather it having a good/decent mic, but honestly that's very secondary to me (but having one integrated isn't, thus why a gaming headset seems like a better plan). Small note on the price: it's set to this amount because by this point I've already been recommended Sony Inzone H6 Air, and am looking for other options at around its price or below to compare and contrast before rushing into a purchase.

So, do you have any suggestions I could/should look up? I'm getting quite tired of looking through countless headsets to try and find some with both Swiveling Ears and Metal Headbands since I've started looking for replacements (and trying some, leading to the current set of criteria) months ago at this point, and so decided to "outsource" my research to the experts and amateurs over here.

Whatcha thinking?

To preface things, I have a very hard time finding headsets that don't feel like a vicegrip upon my head, and while I'm toughing out some HyperX Stingers that are falling apart at the seams I still need a good replacement.

So what do I need? Let me tell you in (rough) order of importance.

1) Swiveling Ears: In my own experience, that's the best thing for me to avoid major headaches due to headset pushing too hard against my head. Left to Right seems more important than Up to Down, and I'm open to other ideas to let the headsets adjust better.

2) Metal Headband: Part of what made the Stinger work for me was its metal headband, which allowed it to get much wider than its normal shape due to the metal's flexibility. I'm not entirely against plastic headbands, but the clamping force either needs to be minimal, or you need to be pretty confident they won't just snap if widened.

3) Price: Ultimately, the cheaper the better, as long as I can get something that isn't actively uncomfortable. I'm not a big audiophile, not do I care about thorough soundproofing. I'd rather it having a good/decent mic, but honestly that's very secondary to me (but having one integrated isn't which is why a gaming headset seems like a better plan).

So, do you have any suggestions I could/should look up? I'm getting quite tired of looking through countless headsets to try and find some with both Swiveling Ears and Metal Headbands since I've started looking for replacements (and trying some, leading to the current set of criteria) months ago at this point, and so decided to "outsource" my research to the experts and amateurs over here.

Whatcha thinking?

As the title indicates, I plan on playing Krak again, since it is a genuinely very interesting start when it comes to both opportunities and dangers surrounding it (a prime candidate to take back Amldhir, yet beset by Frozen Maw/Grombar to the West and whatever Great Power emerges from the Forbidden Plains, Centaur of LakeFed).

However, their starting moves are a right pain in the ass to get "right enough" to not have to restart due to a lack of oppotunities to deal with your early game objectives, as I've come to realize by having more runs I've aborted by the time I met Shattered Crown or Grombar's borders than runs where I've had the time to settle into their fun/unique position on the Northern chessboard.

Thus, the "Krak Playbook", where I'll go through my ideas as to what has to be done to prosper as Krak (without just aborting saves where Frozenmaw/Grombar does well), and where hopefully some of you will provide your own advice, to refine my strategy and help out potential newbies to Krak.

Ideally, I'll try and make the resulting "playbook" into something to be used by people new to Krak too, but we'll see.

1) Exiting the Lonely Mountain

The first real hurdle is both the distance you have to colonize through before your options open up (6 provinces counting Brokenwheel), but also the sheer amount of dead natives you need to stack up to accomplish that. Not only that, but in doing so you have to take a decision that will basically shape all of your early plans.

My constant temptation, and the main way I've played Krak until now, is to rely on the Expansionists to get out faster, and use the extra colonist and speed to claim as much of the Northern Pass as possible before Frozenmaw/Grombar. After all, if you don't act quickly against them and Shattered Crown, both will get strong quickly, and maybe even merge through Grom taking over Shattered.

However, I can see the appeal of the Reclaimers to get Renaissance in much easier and faster, and use the better dev-cost to have more "Ooomph" to throw against Shattered and Frozenmaw. Instead, of "maximising" expansion Westward, a Reclaimer strat sounds like it'd mostly be about securing the Pass and a pathway to Shattered, and then using your greater dev and good tech to either attack Frozenmaw/Grom or Shattered basically as soon as the opportunity comes.

Am I right here? If so, Reclaimers might indeed be a better call even if it lets Grom a bit too much free reign to take the Northern Pass for my liking. Either way though, I reckon it's not worth waiting for more than one bonus due to the ticking timebomb of Grom at your West, and that it might be worth purging the natives whenever not strapped for Mil points.

2) Shattering Shattered Crown

Generally, Shattered tends to be my first target. Of course, Grom is liable to get much stronger than them in due time, but honestly it tends to already be too strong to target easily once I reach them. Thus, fighting Shattered early instead, before Grom tries to eat them, tends to be the main way a Krak game pans out well for me. Go down to Serpent's Vale, ally Dwarves, build up a good army, fight on the defensive, and cut off any borders between them and Grom with the peacedeal.

Still, this isn't a very reliable strat. If you haven't been fast enough, or if you've somewhat lagged behind techwise, Shattered will be more than a match for you, and pound-for-pound Orc troops definitively aren't terrible either early game. Not only that, but it is a plan that almost needs a decent ally to make work (and thus either a hold breaking through Natvir, or emerging in the Eastern or Western branches of the Northern Serpentspine).

What do you think should be done here? Any good, "surefire" ways to get rid of Shattered? Or should I very much focus on Frozenmaw/Grom first instead, and/or attack Shattered through the Serpentspine later?

3) Breaking the Maw (or Holding off Grom)

In truth, I don't think I've ever taken on these guys early. Generally, I build up power by attacking Shattered, taking the Spine, and grabbing chunks of the Forbidden Plains. Thus, my "normal" strategy here is to build a strong border to my West, cultivate alliances with strong Holds/Grombar's Rivals to keep them passive and instead plan on attack them when they falter, or when I outgrow them.

But I don't think that sounds like quite the right plan. How does one deal with Grom early, though? They always are already quite large and powerful by the time I get to them, and if you even wait just a little bit they'll get some powerful allies in the West, more-or-less making them unattackable unless you're certain you can handle that.

What's your take on this? Reach their border ASAP and try to kneecap them? Pray they don't do well, and if they do just hold them off until they don't anymore? More than anything, I find Frozenmaw/Grom difficult to figure out, so I'm really interested in your best tips here.

4) Cracking the Spine

By all means, the Spine is likely your best pathway for expansion as Krak, but also as a dwarf. It does require you to take out Shattered sooner or later, however - they have 4, likely 5 valuable holds and will block the road, after all - so I don't tend to see this as my first order of buisness.

What I really want here is Dûr-Vazhatun (colonized by me), Orlazam-az-dihr (likely colonized by Shattered, thus conquered from them) and the Amldihr region (conquered from Shattered). By the time you have a 7-strong core of Holds (even if 5 of them have been stripped from Dev), most of the Spine has "settled" from my experience and I'd have to take down my frequent Southern Allies of Kozenad or fight Escannians to take more of the Spine.

As you can see, my entire plan here relies on destroying Shattered and taking its place as the main power of the Northern Spine. After that, you're unlikely to find much terribly threatening in your region of the Spine, unless something goes terribly wrong for Khugdihr or Verkal Kozenad, and mostly just need to remember that, due to limited paths of expansion and MTs, dwarven alliances will only hold until your borders meet (most of the times) and that thus you need to plan to always be the stronger partner at that point.

As such, I don't really have a very defined playbook here. Anything you find of note to add to your plans for the Spine? As you'll see, it soon takes a backstage to my actual favorite path for expansion.

5) Taking the Forbidden Lands

(AKA: No Great Power on my Doorstep!)

And this is where you come to the real run-killer I faced my first time through: a united Lake-Fed, which I did not expect since I was still pretty new to Anbennar.

In truth, the reason I prefer getting involved early-ish into the Forbidden Plains is threefold: you will never get a better time to expand into there than before the Centaurs and/or the Lake Feds unite; you are likely to hit a snag either Westwards or Southwards, so opening a path of expansion Eastwards is good longterm; and finally, stopping the Centaurs and the Lake Feds from uniting is (at least I think) necessary to avoid fighting them when they are.

Thus my rough plan; go straight East towards the Lake, vassalize a small Centaur nation (you'll feed it more centaurs), and take the land-route into South-Yarikhoi ASAP (vassalize a chunk of that too if you need to spare your governing capacity).

If it goes well, and you deal with both problems before they fully rear their ugly heads, you'll have accomplished a great deal to secure your lands from any Eastern threat, as well as grabbing "free" land (at least, compared to the alternatives). Sure, it isn't as valuable as the Serpentspine, but that's also why I'd feed it to vassals if at all possible.

What are your tips about dealing with the Forbidden Plains? Was there any big problems with having a Centaur vassal I forgot since last time? Do you know exactly what needs to be taken to avoid either union happening? Is it even necessary to deal with them, or should the Lake Feds not trouble you if you don't go East, and the Centaurs not be too much trouble even if they eventually show up?

Since in many ways this is the "core" of my longterm success (as it is the core of my longterm threats), I'm quite curious what tips you all have here.

6) Wrapping Up

By all means, if I manage to deal with all threats as mentionned above, I don't think there's much chance of there even being a power able to shake Krak's strong foundations as the Northern Great Power. Sure, it requires taking out or neutering four large threats in rapid succession - which is exactly why I'm looking for tips on how to do it as effectively as possible - but the entire point of this "playbook" is to exit the 1500s or so the "winner" of the North, and then either move on to whatever else I still feel like doing, or feel satisfied enough to stop it there for now.

Is there any other major hurdles you feel are worth mentionning, outside of the usual dwarven disasters? Maybe an interesting objective you have for Krak outside of just its MT?

Either way, I'll be happy to see your feedback and advice on the "Playbook"!