The turn-based strategy game Total War: Warhammer III is getting a significant update today, according to patch notes published for update 1.3.0. The massive update will feature new playable units and many bug fixes and changes. Check out the new trailer for update 1.3.0 coming Total War: Warhammer III below and the patch notes below.

Total War: Warhammer III – Update 1.3.0 Patch Notes

Righteous Lances of Wei-Jin – Great Longma Riders Grand Cathay

These formidable lances are the guardians of Grand Cathay’s Sky Fleet. These elite bodyguards protect and serve as the bodyguards of the lords of the skies: cutting through the thickest armor with their master-crafted weapons.

  • ABILITY: Guardian: Reduces damage taken by lords/heroes close to this unit.
  • ATTRIBUTE: Immune to Psychology
  • DAMAGE MODIFIER: Armour-Piercing Attacks

Heralds of Khorne’s Fury – Bloodcrushers of Khorne

Riding into battle with the heat of Khorne’s fury, the Heralds make kindling of all that would challenge them on the battlefield. They wield some of the most ravenous of Khorne’s cursed blades, taking very little to enrage the spirits possessing them with a fiery wrath.

  • ABILITY: Mantle of Immolation (Passive): Confers weakness to fire on all enemy units within the area of effect.

Oath Brothers of Tor – War Bear Rider

Lighting ripples across the weapons and armor of the Oath-Brothers—gifts from their patron god Tor (the Kislev god of Thunder)—allowing them to deliver cutting magic attacks to their foes.

  • ABILITY: Call of Tor (Active): Bombards all enemies surrounding the unit with lightning strikes, applying the ‘Blinded’ contact effect to affected enemies. (Limited use)
  • DAMAGE MODIFIER: Magic Attacks

Barons of The Bog– Pox Riders of Nurgle

To be near the Barons is to suffer from the Wasting Sickness, a weakening aura that weakens the sword arms of nearby opponents. At the same time, their vile steeds revitalize nearby daemons of Nurgle with their foetid gases.

  • ABILITY: Miasma of Rot (Passive): Restores vigor to nearby allied units.
  • ABILITY: The Wasting Sickness (Passive): Reduces the potency of enemy weapons and mass of units caught within the area of effect. This is only active when the unit is engaged in melee.
  • STAT ADJUSTMENT: Increased Armour

Sky-Striders – Crushers (Great Weapons)

These unstoppable riders call the peaks of the long-lost Titans their home, where they explore the mountaintops and fashion the forgotten steel of the Sky-Titans into crude armor and weapons—adding to their potency in battle.

  • CONTACT EFFECT: Frostbite: Reduces the speed of enemies struck in melee by this unit.
  • STAT ADJUSTMENT: Increased Weapon Damage
  • STAT ADJUSTMENT: Missile Resistance

Eternal Entourage– Heartseekers of Slaanesh

The presence of the Eternal Entourage empowers nearby champions to new heights: their worship filling their chosen idol with strength and prowess.

  • ABILITY: Obsessive Adoration (Passive): Empowers the Melee Attack and Weapon Strength of all friendly lords/heroes within the area of effect.
  • ATTRIBUTE: Perfect Vigour

Knights of Immolation – Doom Knights of Tzeentch

Wielding lances imbued with Tzeentchian fire, the Knights of Immolation ride into battle on particularly spiteful discs of Tzeentch: spewing fire on their enemies below. (We know they might not look like your traditional mounts, but don’t let that fool you; these elite cavalries are nonetheless deadly.)

  • ABILITY: Searing Torrent (Active): Bombards enemies directly below with fire damage; also confers the ‘Warpflame’ contact effect. Carries more uses than normal, but the ability only recharges once the unit is in melee combat. (Limited use)
  • DAMAGE MODIFIER: Magic Attacks
  • DAMAGE MODIFIER: Flaming Attacks

Land Battles Join Ranked Matchmaking

Land Battles are now available in the ranked matchmaking pool alongside the existing Domination Battle. Participants now have a 50/50 chance to enter a Land or Domination battle when they queue up for a match.

The following maps are available in the Land Battle pool:

  • Death Pass
  • Arnheim
  • Battle for Itza
  • Broken Leg Gully
  • The Silver Spire
  • Blasted Lands
  • Darkland Crater
  • The Flats of Kislev – Kislev Troll Country
  • Floating Farms – Cathay Farmland
  • Wastes of Slaanesh – Slaanesh Wastelands

Below are changes to the systems that support and enhance the gameplay of Total War: WARHAMMER III.

GAME

Stability & Performance

  • Improved how UI assets are loaded over extended sessions to reduce stuttering and frame drops. We will continue to investigate performance optimizations when navigating the UI to address alongside future updates while also empowering the use of UI skins and mods created by the community.
  • Disabled the cursor in benchmarks to prevent results from being skewed by highlighting onscreen elements.
  • Fixed an issue where certain character resources were being loaded during campaign gameplay, causing framerate spikes.
  • Fixed a rare crash triggered by the AI when defending in battle.

Graphics

  • Fixed the alpha fade-out at death for Blue Horrors to ensure their bodies are cleared from the battlefield upon their death.

UI

  • Fixed several instances where the descriptive text of buildings failed to account for the latest balance changes.
  • Fixed the descriptive text and iconography of the Ogre Monsters’ building chain of settlements to match the version built in camps.
  • Removed the white bar displayed on the top panel upon entering a Battle where Dark Elf units were included in the army of a different faction (such as when seduced to join the army).

Several changes have been made to the Character Details panel:

DEV NOTE:

“Thanks to the amazing work of one of our community modders, Spartan VI, and their ‘UI Performance Patch’ mod, a stuttering issue was brought to our attention when hovering over UI components—particularly when you have multiple mods installed.

The root issue was caused when the game searches for UI modifications that are supposed to overwrite the base look of the UI. The stuttering occurs when the game cannot find a modified file in the manifest for the retail game data, at which point it broadens its search to search through the rest of the mod folders on the disk. The more mods you have installed, the more folders it has to explore and the more stuttering you experience as it does!

The ‘UI Performance Patch’ workaround was to duplicate the mod files in the initial search location—thus negating the need for additional searching and improving performance at the cost of duplicating data. The fix we’re implementing today goes one step further: creating a persistent reference of whether a modification exists in the initial file that gets searched. You’ll still experience stuttering the first time you encounter a new UI component, but it should only happen once and dodges the duplication of data in the game files.

We’ll continue to work on this initial stuttering in the future, so watch for those improvements later on! And thanks, again, to Spartan VI for helping others enjoy the game to its fullest potential!”

  • The list of characters at the top of the Character Details panel now uses the same sorting as the Lords & Heroes dropdown: Lords are displayed first alongside their embedded heroes, and then the rest of the heroes are included at the end of the list.
  • Lords are now displayed with a different frame to differentiate them from heroes.
  • Embedded heroes are now displayed with smaller icons and lines drawn to the Lord they serve.

Here are the changes made in the Total War: Warhammer III update patch 1.3.0 for the gameplay rules, AI, and other mechanics that dictate how the game is played.

GAMEPLAY

General

  • To prevent instances where ranged units hold their fire because a friendly unit is in their line of fire, overlapping units are now considered (by the game as) part of the same unit. This should ensure that ranged units can more consistently carry out firing orders.
  • Small or multiple-entity artillery and chariot units will no longer have collisions when killed. This will help alleviate issues where larger entities (such as the Ogre Mournfang Cavalry) had trouble pathing around destroyed artillery pieces.
  • The Tzeentch, Nurgle, and Slaanesh technologies which previously provided lore passive abilities to Greater Daemon units, now (instead) provide additional uses of the bound spells granted by other technologies.
  • Armies fleeing from Bastion gates are now prevented from making attacks of opportunity. This also prevents a progression-blocking bug that could occur during Battles.
  • Autonomous riders and other entities are now properly reset after resurrection. This allows Burning Chariots to continue shooting where they were previously prevented from doing so.
  • Fixed a bug where matched combat was not triggering for infantry units.
  • Fixed a bug that would prevent certain items from expanding the Winds of Magic reserve.
  • Fixed a bug that caused some entities in flying cavalry units (such as Great Long-Ma Riders) to remain airborne after the unit previously charged an enemy ground unit.
  • Fixed a bug where flying units would wander aimlessly after abandoning melee combat.
  • Fixed a bug where units refused to enter settlements until multiple attack orders were issued.
  • When ordered to attack, groups of units, including ranged units, will now move to a valid position where the ranged units can fire on the enemy rather than to a position in the same zone but too far away from the target.

The attrition from plagues could become very frustrating to deal with in the game, so we’ve made some adjustments to make it less burdening:

  • Nurgle: Reduced the base duration of the Ague plague from 3 to 2
  • Nurgle: Replaced the attrition effect of The Flux with an increase in the casualties from attrition.
  • Daemon Prince: Removed the attrition effect from Bowelsteep and increased the Nurgle corruption it provides.
  • Daemon Prince: Replaced the attrition effect from The Red Ague with high casualties from attrition.

We noticed that the Tzeentch AI factions’ use of Changing of the Ways could become quite irritating. As such, two changes are being made:

  • Minor Tzeentch factions can no longer use Changing of the Ways in the Realm of Chaos campaign.
  • Increased the cooldown applied to AI factions using the ability by ~70%.

AI

  • Improved how the AI scouts forests to generate more informed and decisive AI actions.
  • Improved how the AI utilizes summoned units in Battles.
  • Fixed several issues that allowed the AI to use abilities when it shouldn’t, including after the Battle’s conclusion.

An issue where AI armies would focus (almost exclusively) on backline units is being addressed to encourage more meaningful tactics on the battlefield. This should also address an issue during Siege Battles which would compel the AI to scale walls and march through defending units to enter the city.

  • AI-controlled units will no longer try to push through frontline units just to attack a backline unit.

Spells

  • Direct damage spells now deal magical (non-physical) damage, meaning that Physical Resistance will no longer serve as a layer of defense as previously.

Exploit Fixes

  • Mana reserve effects (such as those provided by the Jade Amulet) are now correctly applied, preventing an issue that could result in infinite magic reserves.

General Updates

  • We’ve increased the power of the Legendary Lords’ innate character traits based on feedback from the community.

We’ve also made changes to the traits granted upon defeating a Legendary Lord:

Factions & Balance

  • Upon defeating The Daemon Prince: The Attrition effect now applies to all forms of attrition
  • Upon defeating Katarin: Enables Frostbite attacks for the victorious Lord
  • Upon defeating Kostaltyn: Enables Flaming attacks for the victorious Lord
  • Upon defeating Ku’gath: Further reduces the ability of a plague to spread from -20% to -80%; Increases Growth from +10 to +30
  • Upon defeating Skarbrand: Charge and Weapon Strength trait bonuses now also apply to the Lord’s whole army.
  • Upon defeating Greasus Goldtooth: Increases the Income from all buildings to +20%
  • Upon defeating Skrag the Slaughterer: Replaces the “Winds of Magic increases when changing” trait with “Winds of Magic power reserve capacity: +8”
  • Upon defeating N’kari: Added: “Speed: +6% for Lord’s army”
  • Upon defeating Kairos: Added: “Winds of Magic power reserve capacity: +5”; Removed the “When fighting Tzeentchian factions” context from spell

Daemons of Chaos

Skills

  • Plague Troopers: Replaced the charge bonus effect with: “Up to Melee defense: +6 for Nurglings, Plaguebearers of Nurgle, Exalted Plaguebearers of Nurgle, and Forsaken of Nurgle units”

Grand Cathay

Units

  • Crane Gunner: Reduced bullet penetration from 2 to 1 (initially 0 before Update 1.2)
  • Crane Gunner: Multiplayer cost reduced from 1200 to 1000 gold
  • Fire Rain Rocket: Increased range increased from 360 to 400
  • Fire Rain Rocket: Multiplayer cost reduced from 1200 to 1100 gold
  • Sky Lantern: Increased hit points from 5048 to 6048
  • Sky Lantern: Multiplayer cost reduced from 900 to 800 gold
  • Zhao Ming: Multiplayer cost reduced from 2000 to 1800 gold

Abilities

  • Fixed an issue that prevented Miao Ying from using her Eye of the Storm ability in combat.
  • Formation Attack: Soldiers who have activated the ability will now more actively seek out combat, making it far more effective in frontal engagements.
  • Yang Harmony: Now provides Melee Attack (+4 to +8)
  • Yin Harmony: Now provides Speed (+6% to +12%)

The following changes have been made to the Lord Magistrate’s abilities:

In the Total War: Warhammer III update patch 1.3.0, we wanted to provide a solution for Cathay regarding their ability to hold the line in infantry combat. As a ranged-focused faction, this is a critical element of their gameplay, which is why we’re making Harmony more potent for melee units by adding melee attack stats to Yang and adding a less impactful benefit of speed to Yin—as we’re generally content with the current performance of ranged units. Other than this, we are partially rolling back the projectile penetration strength of Crane Gunners as we went somewhat overboard in Update 1.2. We are also aware of Cathay’s struggles in the competitive battle space, so we’re introducing cost changes to stabilize Cathay’s position further.

  • Inspired Defence, Inspired Marksmanship, and Inspired Assault are no longer mutually exclusive; all three abilities can now be selected simultaneously.

Added two new mutually exclusive abilities to the Lord Magistrate’s arsenal:

  • Excellent Administrator: Control: +2 (local province), Income from all buildings: +15% (local region)

  • Astute General: Unit experience gain per turn: +100 (Lord’s army), Recruit rank: +1 (Lord’s army)

  • Blades of the Bastion: Replaced the charge bonus effect with: “Melee defense: +5 for Peasant Long Spearmen, Celestial Dragon Guard, Jade Warriors, and Jade Warriors (Halberds) units (Rank 7 and above)”

  • Blades of the Bastion: Added: “Spell resistance: 10% for Peasant Long Spearmen, Celestial Dragon Guard, Jade Warriors, and Jade Warriors (Halberds) units (Rank 7 and above)”

  • Caravan Master: Fixed the ordering of skills in the first line, resulting in the Immortality skill being hidden.

  • Fast Hands: Added: “Missile strength: +6% for Peasant Archers, Celestial Dragon Crossbowmen, Jade Warrior Crossbowmen, Iron Hail Gunners, Crane Gunners, Grand Cannon, and Fire Rain Rocket units (Rank 7 and above)”

  • Looming Lanterns: Added: “Range: +15% for Sky Lantern and Sky-junk units (Rank 7 and above)”

  • Unified Charge: Added: “Melee attack: +5 for Peasant Horsemen, Jade Lancers, Great Longma Riders, Terracotta Sentinel, and Wu Xing War Compass units (Rank 7 and above)”

The following changes have been made to Miao Ying’s skills:

  • Harmonius: Increased the diplomatic relations with Cathay from +20 to +40
  • Persistent Fire: No longer applies its effects twice.

The following changes have been made to Zhao Ming’s skills:

  • Desert Armour: Now applies +10 armor to melee units in Zhao Ming’s army in addition to Zhao Ming himself
  • Lord of Shang-Yang: Added: “Diplomatic relations with Cathay: +20”

Technology

  • The Cathayan technologies Dragon Fleet Aegis and Sea Dragon’s Edict now apply to the faction’s capital rather than Hanyu Port.
  • Harmonic Balance – Yang: Reduced the income effect from 40% to 15%

Items

  • Shield of the Nan-Gau: No longer requires the “grounded” state.
  • Alchemist’s Elixir of Puissance: Increased the number of uses from 1 to 2
  • Alchemist’s Elixir of Iron Skin: Increased the number of uses from 1 to 2

Khorne

  • Bloodreaper: Multiplayer cost reduced from 800 to 700 gold

  • Flesh Hounds of Khorne: Multiplayer cost increased from 700 to 750 gold

  • Gate of Khorne: Now starts with a 60-second cooldown that will only count down when in melee combat.

  • Greater Gate of Khorne: Now starts with a 120-second cooldown that will only count down when in melee combat.

  • Khorne’s Chosen: Replaced the leadership effect with: “Melee attack: +5 for Bloodletters of Khorne, Exalted Bloodletters of Khorne, and Chaos Warriors of Khorne units (Rank 7 and above)”

Kislev

General Updates

  • Fixed an issue that prevented Ataman bonuses from applying the turn they came into effect.

  • Boris Ursus: Now deals Frostbite attacks.

  • Armoured Kossars (Great Weapons): Increased their charge bonus from 16 to 20

  • Armoured Kossars (Great Weapons): Increased their melee defense from 30 to 32

  • Dazh’s Hearth-Blades (Tzar Guards Great Weapons): Increased fire resistance from 20% to 40%

  • Elemental Bear: Are now granted the Chilling Aura passive ability

  • Elemental Bear: Multiplayer cost reduced from 2000 to 1900 gold

  • Ice Guard (both variants): Are now granted 15% spell resistance

  • Ice Guard (both variants): Increased armor from 40 to 50

  • Ice Guard (Glaives): Multiplayer cost reduced from 1200 to 1150 gold

  • Winged Lancers: Increased the charge bonus from 60 to 70

  • Skills in the first group now only offer one effect at level 1, thus matching the format of skills provided to other races. Higher skill levels still provide multiple effects, as before.

  • Skirmisher Traditions: The missile resistance effect now properly affects Rank 7 units and above.

  • Breechloaders: No longer applies its benefits to the basic and spear versions of Kossars, only Armored Kossars, and Streltsi.

  • Dazh’s Brazier: Multiplayer cost increased from 100 to 150 gold

Nurgle

  • Festering Stooges (Exalted Plaguebearers of Nurgle): Multiplayer cost increased from 1450 to 1550 gold

  • Plague Drones of Nurgle: Multiplayer cost decreased from 1200 to 1100 gold

  • Gate of Nurgle: Now starts with a 30-second cooldown that will only count down when below 75% hit points.

  • Greater Gate of Nurgle: Now starts with a 60-second cooldown that will only count down when below 50% hit points.

  • Airborne Agues: Added: “Melee attack: +5 for Chaos Furies, Rot Flies, and Plague Drones of Nurgle units (Rank 7 and above)”

  • Armor of Malady: Fixed an issue that would prevent the melee defense benefit from being applied to Plaguebearers of Nurgle.

  • Cankerous Spread: Added: “Melee defense: +5 for Pox Riders of Nurgle, Plague Toads of Nurgle, and Spawn of Nurgle units (Rank 7 and above)”

  • Putrid Resistance: Added: “Missile resistance: 15% for Beast of Nurgle, Soul Grinder, and Great Unclean One units (Rank 7 and above)”

  • Virulent Contagion: Added: “Speed: +10% for Nurglings, Plaguebearers of Nurgle, Exalted Plaguebearers of Nurgle, and Forsaken of Nurgle units (Rank 7 and above)”

  • Locus of Virulence: Now also grants +100% ammo to Soul Grinders of Nurgle

Ogre Kingdoms

Campaign

We’re increasing the rewards granted by Ogre Kingdoms contracts:

We are overall happy with Khorne’s battle balance at the moment. The only exception is Cultists, who (across the board) will now need to be in melee to recharge the initial cooldown of their summon abilities. We’re adjusting to avoid scenarios where many Cultists can be used to trivialize battles.

In the Total War: Warhammer III update patch 1.3.0, we are making a handful of delicate tweaks to Kislev as we focus on their mid-tier and high-tier units’ performance. Of particular note are the Elemental Bears and Ice Guard; we want to ensure that both are presented slightly more character-richly. The Elemental Bear already has the visual effects of a cold aura, so we’re giving them the Chilling Aura passive ability, which will slow down nearby enemies and stack with Frostbite attacks and Kislev’s spells. As for the Ice Guard, we’re emphasizing their magic armor by granting them a natural spell resistance.

Nurgle has been performing much better in battles since Update 1.2; aside from the Cultist summon tweaks, we’re only making slight multiplayer cost adjustments this time.

We are currently content with the state of the Ogre Kingdoms in battles but will continue to keep an eye on them moving forward.

  • All three missions now offer a bonus reward: meat, growth from camps, or a rare magic item.
  • Roughly doubled the amount of gold granted by treasury rewards.
  • Increased the minimum reward from 500 to 1500 gold. The issuing faction’s treasury determines the exact amount.

Battles

  • Modified the splash attacks of Ironguts and Maneaters to hit smaller entities more consistently.

  • Stonehorn: Reduced their missile resistance from 35% to 20%

  • The combat skills for Greasus Goldtooth and Tyrants now only have two levels as opposed to three, as is the case with other Lords. The first level is equivalent to the second level of other characters.

  • Skills in the first group now only offer one effect at level 1, thus matching the format of skills provided to other races. Higher skill levels still provide multiple effects, as before.

  • Continuous Volley: Added: “Speed: +10% for Gnoblar Trappers, Leadbelchers, Gnoblar Scraplauncher, and Ironblasters units (Rank 7 and above)”

  • Richly Rewarded: Added: “Weapon strength: +12% for Ironguts, Gnoblars. and Ogre Bulls units (Rank 7 and above)”

  • Trained Beasts: Added: “Leadership: +5 for Mournfang Cavalry, Crushers, Stonehorn, and Sabretusk Pack units (Rank 7 and above)”

  • Ravenous Fighters: Added: “Missile resistance: +15% for Maneaters, Gorgers, and Giant units (Rank 7 and above)”

Slaanesh

  • Fixed an issue that prevented Slaanesh’s Wanton Destruction ability from properly increasing the income generated by razing settlements.

  • Fixed an issue that prevented Slaaneshi factions from forming pacts with Beastmen factions via diplomacy.

  • Daemonettes of Slaanesh: Increased the hit points per model from 65 to 68

  • Daemonettes of Slaanesh: Increased the base damage from 8 to 12

  • Daemonettes of Slaanesh: Increased the charge bonus from 20 to 30

  • Exalted Daemonettes of Slaanesh: Increased the charge bonus from 28 to 35

  • Exalted Daemonettes of Slaanesh: Increased the base damage from 10 to 15

  • Exalted Daemonettes of Slaanesh: Increased armor-piercing damage from 28 to 35

  • Soulscent: Increased the bonus armor-piercing damage cap from +25% to +50%

  • Gate of Slaanesh: Now starts with a 15-second cooldown that will only count down when winning in melee.

  • Greater Gate of Slaanesh: Now starts with a 30-second cooldown that will only count down when winning in melee.

  • All Lords now have a campaign skill that increases the replenishment rates of their troops.

Tzeentch

  • Blue Horrors: Reduced their ammunition from 5 to 4

  • Gate of Tzeentch: Now starts with a 60-second cooldown that will only count down when the Winds of Magic reserve exceeds 15.

  • Greater Gate of Tzeentch: Now starts with a 120-second cooldown that will only count down when the Winds of Magic reserve exceeds 15.

  • All Lords now have a campaign skill that increases the replenishment rates of their troops.

  • Accursed Horrors: Increased the missile strength benefit from 4/6/8% to 8/12/16% for each skill level.

  • Exalted Locus of Conjuration: Now grants +25% weapon strength for Horrors rather than +6 armor-piercing damage.

  • Wand of Whimsy: Multiplayer cost increased from 100 to 150 gold

Below are Campaign changes made to the overworld campaign and world mechanics.

For Slaanesh, we’re boosting the stats of Daemonettes, the Exalted Daemonettes, and the Soulscent passive. This should ensure that infantry-heavy play styles are significantly more relevant going forward! Cultists of Slaanesh will also be seeing changes to their summoning abilities, forcing them to commit to combat.

In Update 1.2, we mentioned we were considering bringing the Blue Horrors in line with other inexpensive infantry units by reducing their available ammunition. This is a massive change to their efficacy, so to maintain their relevance in the campaign, we’re tweaking the Accursed Horrors skill effect to ensure they get a notable boost to their missile strength. This won’t quite make up for losing the ammunition. Still, we are already working on a new mechanic to aid in the ammunition carrying capacity of the Tzeentch roster that we’ll reveal in Update 2.0… Stay tuned for more about this soon!

Campaign

  • Fixed an issue where non-Chaos factions would not start new campaigns at war (by default) with nearby Daemon factions—such as when playing as Miao Ying or Sarthorael’s Watchers.

The Realm of Chaos

  • Fixed an issue where AI factions would continue interacting with a subset of rifts after a faction had already won the game.

Changes have been made to counteract the need to proactively camp the Forge of Souls once an AI has collected four souls and teleports to the Forge of Souls:

  • When an AI teleports to the Forge of Souls, players will now be prompted to teleport and confront them. Note that this dilemma will only appear if the player’s faction leader is in a state where they can teleport.

Several changes have been made to prevent Kurgan Warband armies from continuously spawning at the Great Bastion:

  • Reduced the rate at which the threat meter fills.
  • When the threat meter is not full, Kurgan Warband armies will only spawn at each bastion gate when it is razed.
  • The threat meter now reduces when ANY faction attacks and defeats a Kurgan Warband army, rather than just the Cathayan player.
  • Improved visibility into when and why the threat meter is increasing or decreasing at any given time.

Several issues have been fixed in Tzeentch’s realm:

  • Sigils are now revealed upon entering and exiting a teleport locus.
  • Action points are no longer removed when the player interacts with a point of interest in the realm.
  • AI factions must teleport eight times before accessing the final area.

Finally, in the Total War: Warhammer III update patch 1.3.0, several adjustments have been made to the final encounter with Be’lakor to make it less time-consuming and punishing:

  • Reduced the rate at which units enter from the base of the map.
  • During the final wave, killing Be’lakor will cause the remaining daemons to crumble and conclude the battle.
  • Reduced the number of Soul Grinders that accompany Be’lakor in the final wave. Killing them is no longer required to complete the wave.
  • Fixed several issues that prevented Be’lakor from utilizing all his spells and abilities during the encounter.

Quest Battle

  • Frozen Falls: Fixed several issues which would result in the battle being lost despite slaying all the mages.

Below are Battle-specific changes made throughout the game.

Battles

  • Damage dealt with buildings now properly considers damage modifiers to both base damage and armor-penetrating damage in its calculations.
  • Fixed a bug that prevented army abilities from using the current Winds of Magic and magic reserve levels. This also addresses an issue with Arcane Surge.
  • Fixed an issue preventing towers from being built at the end of the construction timer.
  • Fixed a terrain bug that prevented certain towers from firing.
  • Improved articulated vehicle movements (i.e., chariots and artillery pieces) to avoid sudden deaths or areas that would float units when moving through terrain with various elevations.

Ambush Battles

  • AI armies will no longer disregard enemy units in melee when retreating from an Ambush Battle.

Domination Battles

  • Removed the comeback mechanic from the Domination game mode.
  • Battle of Itza: Added 2 additional normal reinforcement points.

Major Settlement Battles

  • Updated the reinforcement lines in the Black Fortress – Greenskins settlement map to prevent attackers from spawning within the settlement.

  • Fixed a bug that could prevent the multiplayer game list from refreshing.

Total War: Warhammer III is now available on PC via Steam; for the full 1.3.0 update patch notes, follow the link here.

We’ve heard your feedback on the Domination mode’s “comeback” mechanic. Before removing the mechanic completely, we wanted to experiment with a few iterations of the economy in the live setting to help us better understand how the game plays and evolves with different economic setups. Ultimately, we concluded (and agree) that rewarding the losing side based on victory tickets isn’t the right way to offset snowball effects.

For now, we will monitor what happens with the game mode in its most natural form. Please keep the feedback coming; as we said before, getting this mode right will be an iterative process.

Additionally, in the Total War: Warhammer III update patch 1.3.0, we’ve added reinforcement points in the Battle for Itza map, which will give the defending player some options to regain their starting area if they’re rushed down the middle.

Multiplayer