Forgefire:
Smart move Admiral, i too was severly dissapointed in Rome 2 after the release. But it got a bit better after some months!
Horace:
I don’t think I could wait regardless of bugs 
Brets will be added free before the end of the year apparently. Warhammer Total War, Civ 6… 2016 is a good year. God knows where I’ll find time for everything
Admiral:
@gIL^: True.
@Forgefire: Yes, the triremes stopped moving on land after some months, and eventually sieges were fixed. With games nowadays, it’s sometimes sound to suppose them to be released in a beta state and lag behind half a year at least.
As for good decisions, adding Brets for free is one such (given the current dubious paywall format for factions), and releasing the Augustus campaign for free on Rome 2 was also a sound move, although the latter would have been entirely justified as a small purchasable DLC. And had I had a stronger computer, I too would probably have preordered and bugs be damned. Total Warhammer? A dream come true!
Skink:
Guys, I have a very old computer and the game runs without lag on it :). Basically, all graphics are set at the lowest quality, and units count 25 men each (rather than 75/80 as per normal settings), but other than that it’s working great :D.
It. Is. Awesome. I had never played a Total War game before and I find the learning curve to be kinda steep (damn Grimgor, he kicks my butt every time), but this is it ladies and gentlemen. A real-time Warhammer battle simulator. I found myself laughing at the Doom Divers screaming “WOOO-HOOO”, raptured by the great work done behind Mannfred’s voice acting, and I still get goosebumps everytime hundreds of Dwarfs scream “Khazador, Khazadim, ah!” when they engage in battle (yes, I am a nerd).
Get this game. Sell your wedding ring if you can’t afford it, because you won’t regret ANY second passed in front of your computer screen.
Forgefire:
Thanks Skink what a great review. A must buy then :hat off
Guys, I have a very old computer and the game runs without lag on it :). Basically, all graphics are set at the lowest quality, and the units count 25 men each (rather than 75/80 as per normal settings), but other than that it’s working great :D.
It. Is. Awesome. I had never played a Total War game before and I find the learning curve to be kinda steep (damn Grimgor, he kicks my butt every time), but this is it ladies and gentleman. A real-time Warhammer battle. I found myself laughing at the Doom Divers screaming “WOOO-HOOO”, raptured by the great work done behind Mannfred’s voice acting, and I still get goosebumps everytime hundreds of Dwarfs scream “Khazador, Khazadim, ah!” when they engage in battle (yes, I am a nerd).
Get this game. Sell your wedding ring if you can’t afford it, because you won’t regret ANY second passed in front of your computer screen.
Skink
Admiral:
A friend of mine warmly recommends it, too, and there was only one bug which he spotted, and that was not even in-game (he had to go offline on Steam to be able to play). It seems polished and very well thought-through, though he found that the high upkeep of units decreased the joy of the game. Mods are already out to fix that, though.
And he also says the atmosphere and flavour of it all is fantastic. :cheers
Skink:
A friend of mine warmly recommends it, too, and there was only one bug which he spotted, and that was not even in-game (he had to go offline on Steam to be able to play). It seems polished and very well thought-through, though he found that the high upkeep of units decreased the joy of the game. Mods are already out to fix that, though.My steam is always running online and I don't have any problem... See, unit upkeep is high... and it is not at the same time.
And he also says the atmosphere and flavour of it all is fantastic. :cheers
Admiral
Like in every tactical game you have a map, and on the map you have places you can conquer, BUT! The map is divided in provinces, each with 3/4 minor outposts and a capital (Talabheim for Talabecland, Barak Varr, Karaz-a-Karak, Castle Drakenhof, etc.).
Each city has structures that you can build to boost your income, to unlock new troops, or to boost other characteristics such as population growth or public order... But you can't build them all. You have only a few "slots" per settlement which can be allocated to a single building-tree. You have to decide on which to invest, so it is completely up to you how to structure your army.
You want hordes of Dwarf Warriors? Low upkeep, low recruitment time, you can have lots of them, but they are not the best of fighters, and are kinda defensive. You want Hammerers? You can, but huge upkeep costs, and so on... so going.
What I really like though is that literally every outpost/capital on the map has a different tech-tree. For instance: Barak Varr can build a port but can't access other Dwarf units, Karak Kadrin emphasizes Slayers and fighting Chaos, Karaz-a-Karak has the full tech-tree, Black Cragg has a gold mine (lots of $$$), other settlements can produce wood/pelts/ores/etc, all of which generate income (the entity of which depends on the goods themselves), or be traded with other factions for dipomatic favours. Yes, it is really this deep.
So, depending on which goals you have, you can structure your realm however you like!
EDIT: ...the game's good unless you totally suck at tactics like me, and Grimgor just keeps smashing everything you throw at him one wave after the other. Damn it!
Admiral:
The Old World lives. Tried it out in a work lull on my brother’s computer. The looks are obviously right, but I had no great hopes beyond the battlefield and expected a pretty shallow and forgettable experience like most but not all GW-licensed computer games (can recommend old Fire Warrior here - it’s basic, but pulls off the atmosphere just right - and Armageddon). Instead this looks to become the ultimate fantasy strategy game of all time, polished and brimming with details. It breaths the Old World through and through. The detail, the depth and the humour are all there, and it’s only going to get more of it for the grand strategy map. It’s especially good to see that Creative Assembly took care to include features unique to various factions, that don’t have any impact on tabletop. Looking forward to see how the Chaos Dwarfs function in Total Warhammer 3.
The factions work differently in a myriad ways, large and small. This is not a gone-with-the-wind rushjob, this is an ambitious project given a whole lot of the thought, love and labour that it deserves. It’s going to keep selling for many years ahead, just like Blizzard’s polished titles have.
As a player of Rome 2 and Attila, I’d say that CA step-by-step mastered their new mode of Total War games through recent products, leading up to a spectacular showing in Total Warhammer. Practice makes perfect.
There is even a grumble-meter for the Dwarf faction!
Skink:
…I can´t put the thing down. Help!!! And I tend to REPLAY THE SAME CAMPAIGN OVER AND OVER AGAIN every now and again! I need counseling…
Admiral:
Blasphemy! You’re not allowed to become addicted before the Chaos Dwarf faction release. :hashut
Malorndk:
I’m so envious of you guys. Small kids are a plague on my game time, so I have not bought it yet. Once they get older I will surely buy into this.
Any good youtube playthroughs or important trailers to keep the hype alive for me?
Forgefire:
This game is as close to perfect as it gets Done multiple playtroughs and some multyplayer aswell. Most recently Khemri which i really enjoyed altough i felt they were a bit too easy even on Legendary!
Forgefire:
By the way are Chaos dwarfs confirmed Admiral? That would be so damn awesome!
Skink:
Malordnk, you can watch “Heir of Carthage’s” videos. He does both campaign and multiplayer, without being overly nerdy, swearing, or making weird @$$ comments.
Admiral and Forgefire: I tend to play both Mazdamundi & Kroq-Gar. And I find the Lizardmen campaign to be by far the easiest!
Dînadan:
By the way are Chaos dwarfs confirmed Admiral? That would be so damn awesome!Dunno if they are confirmed, but I�?Tm fairly sure it was stated before the first game was released that there would be three games; unless I�?Tm mistaken between I and II the only parts that haven�?Tt been covered are the Darklands and Mountains of Mourn, the two Chaos Wastes, and the Far East (Cathay, Nippon and Ind). I can�?Tt imagine III would delve into the Wastes much considering the shifting nature wouldn�?Tt lend itself well to the map-based campaign and Chaos Warriors, Marauders, and Beastmen armies are in I, so unless GW have given the TW team free reign to make up their interpretation of the Far East, I think it�?Ts likeliest that III will be focused on the Darklands and Mountains of Mourn, which means Ogres (definitely as they�?Tre the only major faction yet to be covered I think) and Chaos Dwarfs; and I cant see them releasing a game with just one playable faction making CDs even more likely.
Forgefire
And even if they�?Tre not in the base game, I highly doubt it�?Td be long before they get released as DLC.
Skink:
...so unless GW have given the TW team free reign to make up their interpretation of the Far East...I am fairly positive they did. In fact, one of the factions available is Norsca, which never saw an official release from GW. Some people think that future dlcs will be centered around Araby & Kislev so... we'll see :)
Dînadan
Admiral:
Indeed, Skink. Sweet times ahead! We might very well be looking at the entire Warhammer world summed up in the best fantasy strategy game to date.
It seems native Southland humans don’t figure in the grand map as of II. This is of course because GW never dwelt on it, but for such a polished historically based fantasy world as Warhammer one would half expect there being some short references to WHFB equivalents of the gold mining and slave raiding empires of Ghana, Songhai and the lot (mainly battling Beastmen, Savage Orcs, Jungle Goblins, human tribes and Lizardmen) given the setting’s Mediaeval-Renaissance base. Ah well, a missed opportunity that T9A will cover instead.
Creative Assembly’s next historical title will, by the way, be the legendary swashbuckling Three Kingdoms period in China following the Han dynasty’s loss of supreme power. They could borrow quite much from this work and tweak it for a Cathay release, plus add mythological and fantasy elements like dragons, wizards, stone dogs and martial monks.
If they do this, then one or more Hobgoblin khanate factions to Cathay’s north would be a logical next step. Fuggit might be pleased.
Skink:
It seems native Southland humans don't figure in the grand map as of II...Actually, the southernmost Human civilization of the Warhammer world is Araby, which in the game is represented as occupied by a Bretonnian crusade.
Admiral
In the lore the Southlands were populated by Skaven, the lost Dwarf hold of Karak Zorn, and a few Lizardmen cities (which in the fifth edition were deemed protected from the Skaven by Sotek himself in its physical form, coiled under Zlatlan :D ).
So... There really never were humans in the Southlands.
On the other hand Lustria was home to dark skinned Pygmies, which were featured in the Liardmen army book up until the 6th edition, and the Amazons, which were dropped from the background after the 5th edition.
Admiral:
Pygmies were never dropped, though.
They show up in a reference to a Pygmy Halfling shipped to the Empire, where he eats a nobleman or burgomeister then escapes, from about when Warhammer Realms: Lustria was released in late 6th edition. That tidbit is either in the Lustria book or in a White Dwarf from the release back in 2005. As with so much interesting fringe stuff in the Warhammer world, they just dropped off the radar as the wargame’s straightjacket army book treadmill went on and White Dwarf stopped publishing interesting articles. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, which is true for Warhammer, where Games Workshop made concerted efforts to bring back old fringe elements like Fimir and Zoats during Storm of Magic (this effort continues and goes much futher in 40k at the moment).
That lone Pygmy Halfling reference resulted in me sculpting this victim of a Saurus drummer for my brother’s collection, many years before I discovered the original models of Stuff of Legends.
That said, they always looked like being on the wrong continent, but hey it’s a fantasy setting, albeit one modelled on real history and geography.
Speaking of Southlands, Karak Zorn always gave off vibes of Ethiopia, with its ancient tradition surviving virtually isolated for many centuries and its rock-cut churches (two Dwarf traits off the bat), as well as having vibes of the legend of Prester John. In the Warhammer clone world of the 9th Age, there seems to be real plans to delve deeper into this theme set by GW with T9A’s Kegiz Gavem (Karak Zorn equivalent), as well as give their Southlands version a similar take that GW gave to most of the rest of the Warhammer world; meaning, having major human civilizations present as a generic theme of the setting to spice things up, and modelling them closely on historical cultures. Mostly Renaissance era, but Warhammer also went with whatever is coolest like Mediaeval Bretonnians, Assyrian CDs, ancient Egyptian TKs, ancient Celtic Albion, Viking Norscans and so on.
cornixt:
I expect that they are gone forever, a relic of a past that could be seen as racist stereotyping. Very difficult to do actual human cultures sensitively in a fantasy setting, especially if they were previously mocked.