New Total War game: Warhammer

They generally intend him to be a tragic Mary Sue. It's just that since GW and BL generally cannot into writing it mostly comes off more as a comedy of errors where nothing of value is lost.

 

Its funny but I have seen this thread but never looked into it. Thought it was a joke. I'm sure it will be shit like R2 but still its interesting. When can I pirate it?

 

WHFB Vampire Counts are p cool though I haven't played Total War since Medieval 2.

Lol I wonder how long this has been in development. Would be funny for Total war team to get license and begin production 4-5 years ago only for GW to blow up the fucking world.

 

If you read the "The Last Church" and Emprah's most "striking" arguments against Christianity in the 30th millennium are "muh crusades" and "muh witch hunting" (both 29 millennia ago) then you know his atheism is mostly edgy 20th/21st century highschooler atheism.

But you gotta roll with what you got so: The Emperor protects! He is the most wise being ever to grace Humanity! Everything is working out exactly as he planned.

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(That said, I'm not a heretic, I like the Emperor, but I definitely like the Imperial Cult more than the Imperial Truth.)

 

It also serves as a perfect example of Emprah being completely incapable of any introspection whatsoever.

 

I would rather say that it serves as a perfect example of different writers writing about the same subject in different times without any supervision but you are right that the result is hilarious. And yeah, that Emprah's atheism just shows the intellectual sophistication of most GW writers.

 

Two RPS articles on Total Warhammer in a row. First contains some impressions and second is an interview of Simon Mann by Philippa Warr. No hardball questions.

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http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2015/06/19/total-war-warhammer-campaign/

Orcs Have Tithing Problems In Total War: Warhammer


The Warhammer war game Total War: Warhammer [official site] will have a shifting campaign that will differ hugely in style depending on which of the four announced factions you are playing as. This is according to battle designer Simon Mann, who chatted with Pip in LA this week, in a full interview to follow shortly.

Mann confirms my long-held suspicions when he tells her that Orcs “aren’t really into taxation”. To be fair, neither are most humans unless they’re high enough up the food chain to directly benefit. The Empire, meanwhile, is all about skullduggery.

Greenskins “won’t be going round people’s houses, knocking politely and saying ‘Can I have my tithes please?’ They just find someone else’s village and take it. They’re more about warfare and fighting.” Which differs from the Empire side of the campaign, which will feature more political intrigue, backstabbing and fragile loyalties.

Mann says Creative Assembly is “bringing the Warhammer lore back into this,” even at a basic gameplay level. “We’ve got something called a Waaaaaagh which comes out and that’s if an orc war boss keeps doing really well and winning battles, once that happens you build up momentum and more Goblins and Orcs start following you on the campaign map. Suddenly you’re charging through enemy lands with a giant force.”

The Empire, meanwhile, will be more akin to a traditional Total War faction, but there’ll be plenty of tricksy politicking, given half the populace isn’t particularly fond of Emperor Karl Franz. “There’s a lot more skullduggery,” claims Mann. “You’ve got that reticence towards him as the leader of the Empire factions.”

What this means for the final two playable races, Dwarfs and Vampire Counts, remains to be seen, though we’re promised that “they have unique playstyles as well.” Make sure you check out Pip’s full interview and impressions of Total War: Warhammer later today, which also goes into some of the weirder, and most gigantic, units on offer in CA’s Games Workshop adaptation.

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http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2015/06/19/total-war-warhammer-units/

God Foot: Total War Warhammer’s Wonderfully Weird Units

When I go to watch the Creative Assembly team show off units from their upcoming Total War: Warhammer [official site] game, what really sticks out to me is the sense of humour. I’ve been to Total War previews before and the emphasis is very definitely on serious historical epic battles. This time around I watch a goblin with scrappy-looking wooden wings clamber into a catapult, preparing to fling himself into the ranks of the opposition.

“That’s called the Doomdiver catapult,” grins battle designer Simon Mann. “Goblins volunteer – I don’t know why you would – to have a pair of wooden wings strapped to their backs, get loaded into a catapult and then just get launched. In our game it is kind of silly, and there’s a lot of humour in the Warhammer franchise.”

The demo we’ve just seen didn’t involve a hands-on but it did give a decent peek at a lot of the units from the Empire and Greenskins factions. (Dwarfs and Vampire Counts will come a bit later, with Chaos also very strongly implied in trailers.) The Greenbacks are all manner of weird and wonderful, while the Empire occupies relatively familiar Total War territory – give or take the odd demigryph.

“You’ve got halberdiers, greatswords, swords and shields, but then you’ve also got the newer things,” says Mann. “There’s the steam tank – a war machine – which is a kind of unit we’ve not really done before. It’s got a turret on and the turret can rotate and fire. Then you’ve got the Luminark of Hysh.”

I’m not a Warhammer player but the phrase Luminark of Hysh comes close to convincing me to start. What the hell is a Luminark of Hysh?

“It’s got two Empire wizards on it and something called a bound spell. They’ve locked this spell into this machine that some mages have poured all their power into, called Solheim’s bolt. On command they can wind that up and just fire this ray. It can take down a Giant in one hit. It’s a slow firing beast but pretty powerful, mainly for taking out larger units. If you use it against a group the laser’s so thin it’s not going to take out much, but against a bigger unit…

Mounted units are also well represented with the Empire faction. “You’ve got the Reiksguard, the heavy armoured knights – very medievalesque. Then you’ve got the Demigryph Knights who are riding the wingless griffons. You’ve got lots of variety even in something that’s familiar and loads of the Warhammer lore coming in.”



Facing off against them on the battlefield are the rest of the Greenskins. “They are insane,” says Mann. “There’s nothing in the Greenskin army you’ve ever seen in a Total War game. Let’s start with the goblins – these tiny little goblins, they’re quite weak, their morale is useless. They only join an army when they think they’re going to win. They’re really sore losers. Then you’ve got Orc Boyz which are the rank and file of the Greenskin army and they’re armed with choppers – anything sharp and pointy they call a chopper. Then the Black Orcs – really big and heavy –”

Are they the ones who looked kind of burned and blackened and sicked up bile on things?

“No, they’re the Trolls. This is the start of a thing we haven’t really done before, which is having big units. You get less men in the unit but they’re bigger. The trolls were twice the size of an Orc. You saw them charge in and SWIPE and then they throw up fish over people. They’re hitters. If you’re standing there in a line defending against a charge they’ll crush you. They’re mass.

“Then you saw Grimgor Ironhide who is the leader of all of the greenskins. He’s starting to lay waste to the Old World, which is where we’re setting the game. He’s the biggest and baddest. The leader of the Orcs is generally the one who’s toughest. There’s a dead man’s shoes thing. You become the leader by taking out the leader. He’s the meanest, nastiest of the lot of them.

“Then you’ve got the giant creatures. Did you see the Arachnarok Spider? There’s a platform on top of the Arachnarok with eight Goblin archers. Then the giants – they’re one of the goblin top tier units. They’re a bit like the trolls and can just break defending units. They’re really good at attacking and taking out, but because they’re single entities they can get surrounded and mobbed. They can only attack to the front. In Total War-style everything that has a strength has a weakness as well. We try to make sure things are really balanced.”

Generally, Warhammer seems to lend itself well to the Total War treatment but I ask about points of compromise – any moments where Warhammer and Total War came into conflict.

“Everyone’s desk in the office has all of the rulebooks. We’re constantly reading through. Every decision we make we go, ‘Well, what would Warhammer do?’ Also, we are still trying to make a Total War game too. I think it’s great that we’re trying to straddle two big groups of people.

“The biggest compromise is going to be turn-based. We’re taking what is essentially a turn-based game and putting it into our real-time battle engine. Sometimes stuff doesn’t quite translate directly, but where we can’t translate directly we translate the spirit of the feature. For example, the Doomdiver catapult – in the boardgame you can roll and have it move a little bit after it fires. You can hit there but say it goes off over here, but in our game you’re flying it. If you go into first person mode on the catapult that was being flown.”

You fly that catapult dude?

“We’ve got a guy in the office who loves flight sims so he coded it all up. It flies like a plane so you have roll and pitch. We were playing earlier and trying to do barrel rolls and stuff like that.”

What’s the deal with that giant ghost foot that comes and stamps on things? (Alec would be so ashamed of me right now.)

“That’s Foot of Gork. Gork is the Orc god, basically. He’s quite an angry guy and the Orc shaman can call him down to tread on people. Spells is another whole new thing. Between flying and spells we have two totally new vectors of gameplay on the battlefield. New tactics to deal with. Flying units. Because they’re flying, you can’t get in their way. They can fly over anything you want and then hit down. You can’t stop them easily from hitting you but then if they get caught on the ground that’s their weakness.”

Speaking of flying units, there was what looked like a flying griffon having a barney with a dragon?

“It’s the Orc Wyvern versus Deathclaw, who is Karl Franz, leader of the Empire’s griffon, which he unlocks through the campaign game. The two of them can be fighting in aerial combat. Bringing in the magic as well – it’s powerful. Hundreds of guys were dying with each spell. The Comet of Casandora at the end smashes down – did we win? Did we lose?”

He’s referring to the final bit of the battle footage where a gigantic comet smacked into the battlefield and led into a E3-traditional fade-to-black.

“Those spells are really powerful but they’re a limited resource. If you use them at the right time, brilliant. If you wait too long [the opponent] could kill your shaman, if you go too early it might not do the damage. You have to choose the moment – when the enemy is clumped together just hit the middle and take them out.

And what of the campaign Mann mentioned?

“We’re setting it in the Old World which is – if you imagine the Warhammer universe, the Old World is the centre – the big middle bit. We’re going to have four playable factions. Greenskins, Dwarfs, Empire and the Vampire Counts which I’m really happy about.” (Mann was mostly a 40K player but on his forays into Warhammer the Vampire Counts were his faction of choice.)

“You start with your campaign gameplay. It’s the sandbox style, so you can choose to do what you want, but we’re setting you up with the scenarios like the Empire hate the Orcs, right? That’s just standard. Actually, I think it’s more that the Orcs hate everyone and the Empire have to deal with that. Every faction’s going to play very differently. Previously we had subtle differences between factions – different building trees and [so on] – that’s stuff you’ll see but it’s more pronounced.

“For example, the Greenskins aren’t really that into taxation – they won’t be going round people’s houses, knocking politely and saying ‘Can I have my tithes please?’ They just find someone else’s village and take it. They’re more about warfare and fighting.

“We’re bringing the Warhammer lore back into this. We’ve got something called a Waaaaaagh which comes out and that’s if an orc war boss keeps doing really well and winning battles, once that happens you build up momentum and more Goblins and Orcs start following you on the campaign map. Suddenly you’re charging through enemy lands with a giant force.

“The Empire are much more political and there’s a lot more skullduggery. Karl Franz himself – he wasn’t the first choice to be the Emperor so you’ve got that reticence towards him as the leader of the Empire factions. There’s more politics, there’s a more standard expansion. Then there’s the Dwarfs and Vampire Counts, which we’ll go into more depth later, but they have unique playstyles as well.

Thing is, the units I’ve seen look interesting and varied and the touches of humour might get me to stick with the game in a way I didn’t with previous iterations. But there’s also the Rome 2 question hanging over Total War releases at the moment. That game had a shaky launch, no two ways about it, and it’s a concern echoed in the comments whenever Total War gets a mention on RPS.

“I think the main thing is that Rome 2, yeah, you could say it’s a shaky launch. Since that point we released a lot of content and DLCs and the game has really improved. I liked it on release but now I think it’s in a really amazing state. Then with Total War: Attila coming afterwards we took a very grounded approach and built on all the improvements and fixes and the advancements with the AI. We’re doing the same with Warhammer. We’re taking that solid foundation and taking a big step forward with it and bringing in some new mechanics, but trying to keep the core mechanics correctly functioning.

“We’re trying to be as grounded as we can with our cores, then with the new mechanics putting in a lot of work to make sure each of them is perfect and polished. That said we’re still in pre-alpha so we’ve got loads to do.”

Positive notes are him mentioning that the team actually read the rulebooks (though not which editions), the potential for stuff like Orc Waaaaaghs and the setting being the Old World (doesn't change that the setting's ruined, but better than that new nonsense).

Really worrisome though is how he says that he liked Rome 2 at launch and thinks that it’s amazing now. That does not bode well for his capacity to judge quality, if that’s not him just being polite.

 

Angry Joe is salivating over the game:

 

After their hardball question on whether Molyneux was a pathologic lier or not, I suppose it is not too bad bad they stop doing those. Concerning the rulebooks, I think Warmaster would have been a better start, as the system seems more about managing larger armies, and less about micromanaging expensive champion figures (same as epic was to 40K actually).
Given that the guy is from CA, he cannot really say that he things RTW2 was shit on launch, and is barely passable now (not that it is what I think, as I skipped this one), so that is not too surprising.

 

First in-engine trailer this Friday (July 17th).

 

Is there ANYTHING talking about neutral factions?

 

You are dead
You get it?
Dead, Karl!

 

One bugger shouting encouragements at / making grand speech to thousands of soldiers spread along a battle line many miles long. I can imagine one pikeman telling the others at the flanks "I think he said we're going to purge the cheesemakers."

Love it when they do that in films too.

 

This one's even more amusing since he's not even giving the speech from a raised platform. There's going to be some serious Chinese whispers starting from the front row.

 

At one point he's even on the verge of just mumbling shit to himself.

 

If only those will be its problems... can't wait for the next shitstorm.

 

Can't they just steal some Shakespearean or ancient battle speech instead of trying to write their own crappy ones? The Annabasis or the Illiad are filled with some properly stirring speeches, instead we are left with some horrible "Follow me and we will punish this darkness". I understand its a strategy games studio so they don't have the writing talent on board, but in that case just steal something good.


Also, the recent Age of Sigmar debacle makes me look forward towards this a lot more now. They finally get around to make a proper AAA game to advertise their product just when they killed said product. GW, why do you this....

 

You have to be amazed by just how batshit incompetent GW is to not capitalize on End Times or Age of Sigmar through this new game. Nope, separate deal altogether. Either that or they realized no one would care about those two so they're practicing some intense sweeping under the rug.

 

In an Age of Sigmar adaption they'd have to figure out how to implement gimmicky rules, like yell "For the lady" into your microphone for a charge bonus or look into the face cam for beard comparison in multiplayer.

 

I don't think they'd include minimal effort consolation prize rules for discontinued products in an Age of Sigmar adaptation.

 

http://oglaf.com/moonshine/

 

What's the response to the argument that Total War is shit and hasn't come out with a decent title in yonks?

 

No true,original Medieval came last month to Steam.