But once I get far enough into a campaign to expand my territory and have a few enemies, their agents start to pour into my territory, and only counter-agent actions can stop them from sabotaging my cities and armies. Using agents (or heroes, as they’re called in Warhammer) in battle really is fun-I love sending my Dwarf Runesmith into the fray to buff infantry units with runic magic. Get used to seeing these pop-ups a whole lot in a Total War campaign. Politics and agents are the worst of them.

But in other ways, the basic elements of the series are still there under the fantasy skin, mostly unchanged, and they’re starting to feel pretty stagnant. Lords gain experience from completing RPG-esque quests and earn special equipment, a first for Total War. Greenskins need to build up a Waaagh!! through incessant fighting Dwarfs have to fulfill grudges to keep the populace happy Vampire Counts spread corruption and raise the dead to quickly build huge armies. Total War: Warhammer has more fun with its units than any previous game in the series (I’m still psyched about flamethrower Dwarfs with beard armor), and Creative Assembly did a great job making every race significantly distinct. It’s an ouroboros of strategic mundanity. Which is done by countering them with your own agents. Playing against a campaign map covered with AI enemies all but guarantees that eventually you’ll spend a chunk of every turn dealing with a neverending stream of agents. They can also, more critically, assassinate other agents and leaders, sabotage cities, and inflict casualties on armies. They can spread religion or influence in a region, increase the populace’s happiness or production or technology research rate. On a Total War campaign map, your units are either leaders (Lords in Warhammer, generals in most previous games) who shepherd armies, or agents, who offer more specialized functions. In fact, it’s happened in every campaign I’ve played since picking up the series with Shogun 2 in 2011. This isn’t the first time agents have soured a Total War campaign for me.

Total war warhammer wounded hero