This article was originally published in PC Gamer issue 280. For more quality articles about all things PC gaming, you can subscribe now in the UK and the US.
It’s a sight I’ve been dreaming about since the pixelated days of Dark Omen and Shadow of the Horned Rat. A mammoth pair of Warhammer armies battling across a sprawling Total War battlefield.
On one side, the Empire: featherhelmed humans wielding arquebuses, halberds and swords, backed up by cannons and wizards. On the other, hulking orcs and tiny goblins, variously smeared with war paint, riding spiders, wolves and boars, and reinforced by trolls, wyverns, and giants. On either side of the wide pass, lava drools from mountain crags more than two hundred feet high.
As the battle starts, the Emperor Karl Franz makes a speech from the back of his griffin Deathclaw, promising that if his troops win this battle, he’ll take up the fabled Hammer of Sigmar. It’s a longwinded monologue much like the Rome: Total War pre-battle speeches, and even the Games Workshop appointed loremaster admits “that one’s too long.” Indeed, on the other side of the battlefield, the legendary Black Orc warboss Grimgor Ironhide and his Immortals look rather bored. A low chant seems to emanate from the orc ranks.
With the oratory out of the way, the two armies rush toward one another. I’m shown various clashes—Orc Boys leaping into battle with Empire Halberdiers, Demigryph Knights bounding into Savage Orc Boarboys, Forest Goblin Spider Riders and Arachnarok Spiders literally eating their way through the Imperial Greatswords, Goblin Wolfriders charging like the Light Brigade into massed cannons, volley guns and rocket fire, and trolls vomiting acid lugubriously onto the unfortunate, frantically-firing ranks of handgunners.
Forest Goblin Spider Riders and Arachnarok Spiders literally eat their way through the Imperial Greatswords.
Of course, this new game can’t be completely accurate to the tabletop. It has to do that Dawn of War thing where it combines accurate game mechanics with outrageous bombastic battle scenes. So large units such as trolls do area attack strikes, much like Total War’s elephants, which send the Empire’s swordsmen flying. “There’s a lot of work we’ve done on the animations, to make the combat seem more dynamic and responsive,” project lead Ian Roxburgh tells me. “The sheer amount of animation is huge—even down to the amount of different skeletons, thirty types as opposed to five or six in previous Total War games.” We see a giant demonstrate this, picking one soldier up to bite his head off. Apparently, this giant can also dash his enemies against the ground, sweep with his massive club, and belch to devastating effect.
Amid the masses, infantry heroes—a Witch Hunter, a Warrior Priest of Sigmar, Grimgor—contribute to the grim carnage, while the mounted wizards and shamans hang back. A delicate wizardly war machine, the Luminark of Hysh, knocks down a towering giant like a coconut at a shy. Above everything circle wyverns and Deathclaw, dogfighting like gypsy moths.
Flight is something new to Total War. “Air-to-air is obviously something we’re still working on,” Roxburgh tells me as we see Deathclaw down one of the wyverns. The griffin progresses to attacking Grimgor’s Black Orcs, whirling them up into the air before dropping them at the peak of a loopthe-loop. They rarely survive.
From every angle, it looks like the miniatures come to life, much like Dawn of War did for Warhammer 40,000. “It’s a Total War game, y’know,” says Al Bickham, studio comms manager, Ogre Kingdoms wiz and former PC Gamer contributor. “A grand campaign game, with huge, thrilling battles many of thousands of troops on the battlefields, married to Warhammer. It brings to life a spectacle that nobody has attempted before in a Warhammer game.”
Though it looks like Warhammer, I can’t play it yet—indeed, even the developers mostly aren’t playing it, admitting this is an alpha, and more a scripted sequence of events than anything like a game yet. Though Bickham, Ogre Kingdoms player, does demonstrate that at least the Goblin Doom Diver catapults are fully working, as he flings a batwinged goblin fanatic into the air and steers it across the endless Empire ranks before diving its spiked head into the densest imperial formation he can see.
One thing is notable—the scale. There are hundreds of fighters on screen here. At a rough estimate, the cost of each of the armies would be at least a thousand pounds (if you bought it from Games Workshop rather than high-quality knock-offs), probably more, even with today’s plastic figures. Very few people play with armies this size anyway—playing the Total War version rather than buying the figures is definitely going to be more economical. And much, much easier to set up.
It’s certainly comprehensive. I was lost trying to count the number of different unit types on the battlefield. “There are still other units we haven’t put in to that particular battle,” Roxburgh says. “The amount of variety we have per race is just massive. Within any race there’s more variety than within the totality of any previous Total War game.” The units in this battle were a mix of the low- and high-tier units unlocked later in the campaign.
And that’s just these two factions. I’m well aware that at least two more are coming. The Vampire Counts are one of the undead factions, which has a variety of weak skeleton and zombie and superpowered vampires, all of whom are immune to fear and morale checks. Which is handy, given how many giant, scary soldiers the orcs have.
The other race is the Dwarfs, who are even more cannon-heavy than the Empire, with an array of gadgets such as gyrocopters and flame cannons alongside slow, tough warriors like the Longbeards and Trollslayers. Roxburgh explains: “there’s a smattering of other minor races, which we’re not talking about yet, but they occupy the world as well. There’s not just four different races and that’s all.” Bickham chimes in: “you can’t have a Warhammer game without Chaos. It’s the cornerstone of our IP. Khorneerstone.” There’s a groan.
Diplomacy might have to change from the old Total War model, given the lack of connection or communication between the Warhammer factions. “The nature of the Warhammer franchise is that there are certain relationships that you can’t see changing,” Roxburgh says. “Chaos and Elves for example. But in a sandbox environment, if you really work hard on it, there’s nothing to say you have to be at war with the Greenskins all the time, you might be able to broker some dubious peace temporarily—but that’s not something you just do run of the mill. We want to be true to what those relationships are, but we don’t want to pull people into a linear game where they’ve got no choice. It’s finding that balance, while maintaining that flavour.”
You can’t have a Warhammer game without Chaos. It’s the cornerstone of our IP. Khorneerstone.
The campaign map, which they’re not showing today, will be something completely new to Warhammer, set in the Old World in a non-specific timeline. Writer / loremaster Andy Hall explains that, though turns pass, no real time does. There isn’t even weather. It’s like living in a perfect instant of Warhammer. “There aren’t seasons in the Warhammer world anyway. One day it’s raining teeth... the next, the sun’s under the sea.”
Anyway, it’s in this timeless instant that you build units, presumably from your cities, though each faction will behave in a different way. “There’s a wider variety, not just in the tactics and unit rosters, but the way we use the features in the campaign game. For example, if you’re the Greenskins, you’re not going to be spending much time building, you’ll be fighting enough battles to build up enough momentum for a Waaagh.”
The Waaagh, for the Greenskins, is essentially the yobbish spirit of the race. As long as orc Warbosses are fighting battles, they get stronger as a force and individually, and attract more orcs to their cause—but pause from war and they’ll start fighting among themselves. “You’ve got this balance between building up this momentum, keeping the battles going, keeping the boyz excited, or suffering animosity,” Hall explains. In battle this is represented by Warbosses being able to call down a Waaagh, to give all their troops a boost of fighting spirit.
Every faction is differentiated like this. “We’re playing with each of the races like it’s an individual Total War game in its own right,” says Simon Mann, battle designer. “They are so diverse, we want to revel in that.” Similarly, they’ll have diverse tech trees, preventing you from just building an army of giants straight away. “You’ve got various building chains that develop as you go along you’ve also got technology. However, for some races that’s a very shallow part of the experience, for others it’s a very deep part of it.” I’d guess Orcs will be the former, Dwarfs the latter.
Yet more diversity comes in the faction’s reactions to morale. Leadership and routing has always been a huge part of the Warhammer game, fear and terror its bread and butter. Monsters, defeat in combat, spells—anything can make your troops rout. “The Comet of Casandora coming down on your head will make you run away quite quickly,” says Mann. “Of course, different factions react differently. The goblins have got no morale whatsoever, they’re going to break at the first sign of anything dangerous, whereas the Empire Greatswords will really be able to hold the line for you, with a big charge bonus they’re a real tank unit.” And the undead presumably suffer from morale differently—if the tabletop game is followed, I’d predict that instead of running away, they’ll progressively fall apart.
The Comet of Casandora signifies one of Warhammer’s most notable additions to the Total War universe: magic. I see three devastating spells in use in the game. A goblin shaman uses the Little Waaagh to cast ‘Curse of da Bad Moon’ on a squad of Outriders and Pistoliers, summoning a randomly-moving vortex moon that wipes them out. Next I see an orc shaman casting ‘Foot of Gork’, a giant ghostly stamping orc god, which flattens the Empire’s lethal Steamtank and Luminark of Hysh. Finally, I see the Empire’s surviving Celestial Wizard call down in desperation the indiscriminately lethal Comet of Casandora, which wipes the battlefield clean.
Certain areas of the campaign map are more magical than others due to the varied winds of magic sweeping down from the northerly Chaos Wastes. This means that your wizards will go into battle with semirandomised mana pools, which regenerate over the course of the skirmish. This helps balance the wizards, which can be game-winners by themselves at tabletop level, but which are glass cannons here. “Balance is a very important part of what we’re doing,” Roxburgh says. “Yes, casters can do a lot of damage, but at the same time you’ve got to keep them safe.”
“In games like Dark Omen, the wizard was there to counter the fact that you were outnumbered,” says Mann, “whereas in our game they’re more of a support class. On their own, they’ll be isolated and killed. But when they’re in a big army and they’re supporting the main thrust of the tactics you’re using, that’s where their place on the battlefield really comes alive.” The Creative Assembly team still want this to be a Total War battle, where you worry about troop positioning, and they don’t want to lose that through micromanaging magic. “It’s the same as giant or flying creatures,” says Roxburgh “they’re another part of your toybox. We’re going to keep the micromanagement light.”
As they complete quests heroes unlock mounts and items. A Warboss can upgrade from a chariot to a wyvern.
Wizards are represented in the game as Total War agents, alongside other heroes, of which there are three or four different kinds per faction. ‘Lord’ characters can be recruited to command armies. “They have a much deeper skill tree and you’ve got more flexibility to tailor them how you like,” Roxburgh tells me—they can be more melee based or more campaign based.” “There’s no concept of ageing or dying of old age. You’ll have most of them for a long period of the campaign game, so you’ll have more chance to specialise them. This Lord might be all about pillaging and looting, a cash cow if you’re the Greenskins, while this Lord might be focused on melee.” Customisable lords can die in battle.
As they complete quests (see below) heroes unlock mounts and items. For example, a Warboss can upgrade from a chariot to a wyvern. Each race also has one or two Generals, legendary heroes of that faction, like Karl Franz or Grimgor. They differ from the other agents in that they can’t die—if these legendary heroes get injured they take a few turns in the wilderness then come back. Other Lords can be recruited to lead your armies when you’ve built up enough momentum in the campaign. And your normal heroes are agents, recruited in the age-old Total War fashion.
A hero’s placement on the campaign map affects their use in battle. “Your agents on the campaign map become your heroes on the battle map,” says Roxburgh. “Attach them to an army, and they come into battle as a single entity unit, like the Warrior Priest.” However, hero abilities will differ from traditional agents—there won’t be any WarriorPriests converting orcs to the worship of Sigmar.
Taking a leaf out of Endless Legend’s playbook, The Creative Assembly has included some of the Warhammer universe’s rich lore in the shape of quests. These enable your legendary characters to unlock unique items, new mounts and upgrades by following narrative in-game chains. “These are a series of missions that culminate in a quest battle,” Roxburgh explains. “It’s a way we can bring story and narrative into the game without breaking that essential sandbox dynamic. Players don’t have to undertake these quests, but if they want to unlock Ghal Maraz or a new mount, this is something they do.”
For example, the Battle of Black Fire Pass I’m watching is the final stage of Karl Franz’s quest chain to unlock the Hammer of Sigmar. (Warhammer nerds will know that the First Battle of Black Fire Pass was where Sigmar defeated Nagash, and that it’s the one place in the World’s Edge Mountains where the orcs can enter the Empire.) When you win these battles through the course of the campaign, you’ll be able to play them like traditional Total War historical battles.
It has to be admitted that Total War and Warhammer are things close to PC Gamer’s heart. Indeed, three of the five developers in the room with me are ex-PC Gamer writers, and all of them are old Warhammer players—like Mark Sutherns, the development manager. “A lot of the guys have come out of the woodwork, with loads of their miniatures. Now we have games, painting sessions at lunchtime. It’s really brought the studio to life...” On this evidence, there’s a good chance that they’ll bring the Old World to life too.
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