Episode 404: Total War: Warhammer Revisited

[Rob Zacny]

Three Moves Ahead 404:

Total War: Warhammer Revisited
It's episode 404hammer and Rob, Fraser, and T.J. Hafer revisit Total War: Warhammer. With the sequel fast approaching, Rob had the itch to play some morehammer and see how the series has evolved. Far from being a borehammer, the newest races and expansions seem to have expanded the gameplay and and embraced the lorehammer. Rob's enthusiasm is infectious and everyone on the panel feels the esprit de corpshammer as this game turns out to one of the finest Total War games in the lineup. Warhammer.

Total War: Warhammer, Total War series

 

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[ilitarist]

Funny how you say it's the first time TW factions feel really diverse. Because IIRC you've said something like that about Attila and it was an important selling point. There it was probably mostly in grand strategy, not combat. I.e. Romans start overextended, Huns can never settle, Eastern Empires know how to run a country. Later they've added some DLCs that felt very... forced. Like Picts who were guerilla fighters. Makes sense probably, they didn't use that blue paint for nothing, didn't they? But then there are Slavs who... Use poison?.. And build Wonders?..

 

And before that they really tried it in Empire with all that dynamics of Europe VS Natice Americans VS Indians. They even released special DLC about Native Americans, but when you played as Europeans those natives were doomed and you got that very experience of advanced armies with their pretty troop line smashing traditional armies. I haven't delved into Warhammer yet but even the best TW game I've played - Attila - felt relatively boring in combat even when strategic layer was fun. Mostly because inherently all those battles are won or lost before they've started.

 

I rate this episode 10 out of 10 for mentioning Rise of Nations but subtract 3 for continuing bullying of brave game journalist Fraser for his subjective opinions.

[Fraser]

On 8/27/2017 at 1:47 PM, ilitarist said:

I rate this episode 10 out of 10 for mentioning Rise of Nations but subtract 3 for continuing bullying of brave game journalist Fraser for his subjective opinions.

 

<3

[JoeR]

Great episode guys. Your diversion onto Age of Empires IV made me think of the Empire Earth series. I never played three as i understand it was kind of trash but I have great memories of EE1 & 2. 

 

Especially EE2. I seem to remember it had a cool territory control mechanic. Did you ever play those?

 

(Although I did/do have a copy, I never actually played Rise of Nations!)

[Valorian Endymion]

Very good episode!

 

One thing that was a huge improvement was the better victory conditions, noticeable late dlc factions feature much more varied possibilities, which avoid the whole - conquer X, Y, Z which often lead to a not so good late game in other Total War games, here even the more basic factions, which still follow that concept, don´t have much conquer X, Y, Z or at least the place required are the same,  while factions added later on, have a more different victory conditions - fas example, for Brettonia conditions, are very simple - just get chivalry to certain levels, allowed me to play all I did was defend Bretonnia main land and at best kept a advance post here and there while leading some armies just to help the Empire. Until the last step, where you need to go for one final quest battle in the middle of Chaos Wasteland, which was fun, since I had to lead lots of armies over long distance - dealing with attrition and other chaos armies, in which kind felt like a crusade (or Erratic War to use the lore term I guess).

 

I suspect that the mega campaign might be a mess when released, but since isn´t the focus of the Warhammmer II, I don´t mind much, since the actual game is more close to what they do better from what previews and other stuff are pointing it.

[Fraser]

On 8/31/2017 at 8:11 PM, JoeR said:

Great episode guys. Your diversion onto Age of Empires IV made me think of the Empire Earth series. I never played three as i understand it was kind of trash but I have great memories of EE1 & 2. 

 

Especially EE2. I seem to remember it had a cool territory control mechanic. Did you ever play those?

 

(Although I did/do have a copy, I never actually played Rise of Nations!)

 

Empire Earth 2 was fantastic, and I can't believe none of us mentioned it.

[warthurton]

I have no affinity to Total War.  I owned TWW but none of the DLC.

 

To have good experience what, if any, of the DLC is a must have.

[Fraser]

On 9/4/2017 at 4:22 PM, warthurton said:

I have no affinity to Total War.  I owned TWW but none of the DLC.

 

To have good experience what, if any, of the DLC is a must have.

 

I answered this very question for RPS https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2017/04/28/total-war-warhammer-all-dlc-review/

 

That was published before Norsca was announced, but I would include that in the must buy category too. If you're on a budget or want to limit yourself instead of buying the lot, I reckon that the Wood Elves and the King and the Warlord DLC will keep you entertained. With that you get a mini-campaign, the Wood Elves faction, and new Greenskin and Dwarf leaders, starting locations and units.

[Sorbicol]

Thread Necromancy 101..... 

 

a friend bought me this in the steam sales over Christmas, and it’s been my first proper attempt at a Total War game. 

 

I find it to be both deeply engrossing and really quite frustrating pretty much in equal measure. There’s a lot to enjoy for sure, and the strategic layer is quite well thought out and presented. The battles are fun but chaotic and the game is terrible at presenting useful information in the heat of battle. I’ve watched so many YouTube channels to get my head around it all and I still get too times when what happens on screen doesn’t make any sense to me at all - or is pretty much the opposite of what I was expecting. 

 

That has has been my main source of frustration with the game to be honest. It’s starting position is very much that it expects you to know how to play a TW game, and doesn’t really feel like it wants to teach you. It made me think quite a lot about tutorials in strategy games and how much responsibility a game has, not only to teach you how to play it, but also to play it with some level of competency. I know that a lot of people would say ‘well, it’s up to you to get good’ and that it’s part of the fun, but sometimes I find this whole process in a video game to mostly be the equivalent of self flagilation, with deeply frustrating and obscure mechanics seemingly put in the game by developers just to torture you, and what explanations the do provide to be limited or lacking in important details.

 

I admit I find YouTube videos now to be an important entry point for many of the games I play these days - I would never have coped with getting to grips with Stellaris (for example) if I hadn’t watched all the ‘All Hail Blorg’ videos realeased by Paradox in the run up to release.  

 

Im not sure if that’s just me - I don’t remember having so many issues back in the days pre-internet and YouTube. It feels a little like developers are lazy these days and expect YouTubers and the like to pick up the slack. Or maybe I’m just turning into a miserable old codger. 

[Gormongous]

6 hours ago, Sorbicol said:

That has has been my main source of frustration with the game to be honest. It’s starting position is very much that it expects you to know how to play a TW game, and doesn’t really feel like it wants to teach you. It made me think quite a lot about tutorials in strategy games and how much responsibility a game has, not only to teach you how to play it, but also to play it with some level of competency. I know that a lot of people would say ‘well, it’s up to you to get good’ and that it’s part of the fun, but sometimes I find this whole process in a video game to mostly be the equivalent of self flagilation, with deeply frustrating and obscure mechanics seemingly put in the game by developers just to torture you, and what explanations the do provide to be limited or lacking in important details.

 

This is interesting, because Creative Assembly has made it its explicit goal since Rome 2 to reduce the number of systems to onboard new players more easily. I think there's a fundamental misunderstanding there, because fewer systems doesn't always mean less complexity and, often, the increased level of abstraction results in large, important systems that are very difficult to take in at a glance. Rome 2's weird, hyper-abstracted family trees at launch are a good example, they're simpler but so much less intuitive (because people know how family trees work but not vague "buckets" of individuals). I don't know, I keep hoping that Creative Assembly gets better at UX and systems interoperability, but I don't think that they actually need to because, like Bethesda and its games, they occupy their own subgenre with a loyal community of modders who'll fix all their oversights and mistakes.