TOTAL WAR: WARHAMMER III
DEV UPDATE #1
Greetings!
Today we’ve got a swift developer update for you all, where we take a stripped back look at what we’re working on for Total War: WARHAMMER III so you’re all kept in the loop as we approach Shadows of Change and beyond. We plan to drop a few of these posts, so keep an eye out for more of these in the future as these are just a selection of the improvements we're making.
In between these dev updates, you can head over to the official Total War Discord server to share your thoughts with fellow Total War fans in the WARHAMMER discussion channel!
So, let’s dive straight in with the changes coming to Immortal Empires, straight from the developers.
IMMORTAL EMPIRES ACHIEVEMENTS
We’ve heard your cries for Immortal Empires achievements, and we’re super excited to reveal that they're finally coming! We completely agree that they’re a great way to track progress, as well as encouraging players to tackle different races they may have otherwise overlooked.
What are we doing?
Each playable race from Total War: WARHAMMER I and II (and Chaos Dwarfs!) are receiving two achievements – one for completing the Immortal Empires campaign, and one for completing the campaign on Very Hard or Legendary. The achievements will pop once you have met your Long Victory conditions once you hit the records screen after achieving ultimate victory or domination. (Small change there during development!)
Where are we at?
We are currently testing these achievements on our end to make sure they work smoothly, and we are also selecting artwork for the Microsoft store as they use a different sized images rather than achievement icons like on Steam and Epic.
Here's a little peek at the icons!
IMMORTAL EMPIRES TUTORIALISATION
We felt that the first few turns of the Immortal Empires campaigns felt a little bit... barebones. Players are dropped in without much context and can often be a little directionless. With the removal of flybys, there also was a lack of narrative to each campaign.
What are we doing?
Campaigns now start with missions, guiding you to attack the starting enemy army, capture the enemy settlement, etc. Currently, they are mostly shared across all factions, but over time, we can make them more bespoke, adding in narrative and even specific tutorials for unique faction features where necessary.
Where are we at?
These are ready for all Immortal Empires campaigns! Over time we can expand this feature, so please keep us posted on what you’d like us to consider when making campaigns more friendly to newcomers.
BATTLE DIFFICULTY SETTINGS
We’ve received a lot of feedback about how the Battle AI can be seen as cheating on higher difficulty levels, as they get a lot of bonuses to specific stats.
The difficulty options are quite rigid, and we know that some players want a harder challenge from the AI without them simply receiving bonuses to specific stats that make them hard to counter.
We are always looking to make improvements to the Battle AI, whether that’s fixing bugs or extending it, and this is another step on that journey.
What are we doing?
We are adding an additional slider to the Battle Difficulty settings to control the bonuses that the AI receives to specific stats, separating this from the chosen difficulty. This will be available both in campaign and custom battles. This gives the player a much finer degree of control over the AI that they fight against, and allows for a more customizable, nuanced experience, should the player choose to do so.
Where are we at?
This change is ready to roll and fully functional!
LANDMARK BUILDINGS
We know you love landmark buildings, we’ve seen a lot of discussion around them in the community. We’ve also noticed that Immortal Empires has plenty of room for additions!
Updating three races in Shadows of Change allowed us to look at the campaign on a broad basis, so it was a good time to add some more!
What are we doing?
We’re adding several new landmark buildings across the campaign map.
Where are we at?
They are ready to roll! We are just fine tuning some effects based on playtesting feedback.
Find some sneak peeks below...
And that’s all for this post – keep your eyes peeled for the next one!
Our goal is to keep these quick and to the point, so let us know how you’re feeling about these over on our social channels below, and we’ll see you on the battlefield!
—The Total War Team
For the latest news and announcements, don't forget to visit our official social channels.