Total War: Warhammer – I will not stand idle!

Total War: Warhammer is the first game of the Total War series I’ve ever played and the first one with a non-historical setting in general. I can honestly say: It was a wholly new, mind-blowing experience. You see, I have played strategy games before. Among those are Age of Empires 1-3, Starcraft 1 and 2 and Warhammer 40k: Dawn of War – games I loved and cherished. But the sheer depth AND spectacle (usually it's one or the other) will keep my fascinated for a long time to come.

Preparing for War

 

First, you start out innocently enough on a turn-based campaing map. There are buildiungs to build, heroes to recruit (they can obstruct enemy movement or assassinate characters), and armies to move, represented by the general's avatar. Then there is the diplomacy screen, where you can find trading partners, declare war, or bribe your way into peace and eventually join forces to overcome a common foe. Another feature that you should definitely use is the tech tree, where you can improve your civilization both economically and in battle.

Speaking of battles: They are enoromous, involving hundreds of brave soldiers and fierce creatures, and quest battles even come with a cinematic intro. The scale is truly epic, and using different kinds of terrain adds a lot of depth that other strategy games are missing. The cornucopia of tactics includes, but is not limited to: Ambushing enemy infantry from a forest, nosediving dragons into artillery crews, or harassing zombies with mounted gunmen on an open field. All this is fairly easy to learn, but hard to master, and ensures long-lasting fun.

 

Greenskins on Boars. Source.

The Factions: The Good, the Evil, and the In-Between

 

Total War: Warhammer comes with 5 factions: The Empire, the Dwarves, Greenskins, Vampire Counts and Chaos Warriors. The Empire, most similar to the armies playable in historical Total War games, not only command your usual sword'n'board types of infantry, but spice it up a little with wizards, Demigryph Knights and a Steam Tank, which is absolutely lethal at any given distance. They are lead by a bloke called Karl Franz, who has about the same character complexity as Arnold Schwarzenegger in The Terminator. 

The Dwarves are stout little soldiers who don’t use cavalry or sorcery but have some fatal artillery and Gyrocopters armed with bombs. They are easy to start out with, but hard to master. Their eternal rivals, the Greenskins, feature brutish Orcs and Goblins riding giant spiders; also, they have to fight almost constantly, otherwise they start killing each other. The Vampire Counts use necromancers to summon zombies and the like but also throw in some feral night creatures: Bats, Dire Wolves and mutated vampires (Vargheists). As you can imagine, they are not hugely popular with the other factions, and have a hard time approaching others diplomatically. 

Finally, there are the satanic Chaos Warriors, who bring the apocalypse upon the land (the End Times) and are the hardest to play, because they are nomadic and are, hardly surprisingly, even less popular than the Undead. Also, you have to buy a "day-one" DLC to unlock their campaign, which had fans run amok in the forums, as the forces of Chaos are a crucial part of Warhammer and shouldn't have come with an extra price tag attached. Speaking of DLCs: The Bretonnians, a human race that focuses on medieval cavalry, have been announced to be featured in a free DLC in the near future and are already playable in multiplayer.

Steam Tanks are Love. Steam Tanks are Life. Source.

As you can tell by now, both in and off the battlefield each race acts differently, which makes the campaign very interesting, even if you find yourself on the same (admittedly huge) campaign map each time you play. However, once your soldiers and monsters – be they pegasus knights, or giants – are on the battlefield, they all look pretty, pretty small. It is only later that, as you feel more confident, you will find time to sit back or zoom in and watch beautifully animated toy soldiers bash each others’ heads in, a very enjoyable spectacle. 

 

Public Disorder

Although fighting is – as the title suggests – one of the most important things in Total War: Warhammer, there are many other concerns that may not be neglected, and less important fights can be auto-resolved by the computer. An issue I stumbled upon a few times is “public order”, particularly important with the Empire faction. If your citizens are not happy, they will start marching on your cities, lead by traitors. But because of how distracted I was with all the other stuff to worry about – diplomacy (10+ human factions alone), income, army size, army movements (limited per round), buildings, technology, hero skills – I initially didn't understand how to gain favour with the common folk.

 

I knew that it was a clever thing to deploy one’s general in a troubled city – enforcing law and order – but that wasn’t enough. When I reduced taxes (much as in real life, Warhammer citizens love that), things got out of hand because now I was facing bankruptcy. So I went online and found out: You can build a tavern and people will chill (also, churches help in reducing vampiric or chaotic corruption). Thus, micromanagement becomes important. If you cram your city with military facilities, there won't be enough space for economy and recreation (that is, until the city grows another level, which takes a loooong time). For beginners it is thus advisable to start out with a tavern and a harbour if possible (which generates money) before fully committing to building an army. 

A battle between Vampire Counts and the Empire - Things are about to get messy. Source.

My experience as a newcomer is: Total War: Warhammer is not a game that you will fully comprehend within 15 minutes. But if you are willing to slowly discover the game’s core mechanics, you will be rewarded with plenty of hours full of fun. The advisor does a good job of teaching you the basics, but nevertheless would it be helpful if the game didn’t spam you with events where you have to make tons of decisions at once.

 

For instance, the game would have been much easier to learn if diplomacy would have started in round 25 instead of around 5. But after you have made a mistake or two (NEVER join a war if you’re not 100% ready), you will be able to enjoy the game’s complexity. In addition to the single player, Total War: Warhammer features coop campaigns as well as custom battles between players and/or against the AI.

 

A Feast for Warhammer Fans

 

Having such an excellent strategy game set in the Warhammer Fantasy universe really is a blessing to me. As someone who has no time to go to tabletop tournaments, I deeply enjoy collecting and painting Games Workshop’s miniatures, but used to prefer Warhammer 40,000, as Relic Entertainment's Dawn of War had offered me a videogame experience along with the miniatures.

 

It is probably partly due to this lack of onscreen representation that Warhammer Fantasy became less popular overall, prompting Games Workshop to do a makeover called Age of Sigmar, which resulted in redefining and in some cases outright cancelling entire model lines. Just imagine the disappointment of Total War-inspired newcomers when they learn that the Bretonnians they know and love from the videogame simply don’t exist as miniatures anymore.

The campaign map. Source.

However, I am unwilling to end this review on a negative note, particularly so since Games Workshop’s missteps are not the game’s fault. Total War: Warhammer’s tactical battles offer tons of fun and authentically represent the tabletop universe. The Total-War layer on top of it perfectly fits the setting, and events that spontaneously pop up add to the experience, regardless of whether Averland declares war on Talabecland, the Winds of Magic change direction or the gods get angry. The game provides a lot of variety and winning battles and progressing in the storyline is very satisfactory, making Total War: Warhammer my top game recommendation for this summer, and probably my personal game of the year.