Total War: WARHAMMER III: Complete Beginner-to-Veteran Guide

How the campaign map and real-time battles work, what to build in your first 20 turns, how to pick a starting faction, and what the new Lords of the End Times release changes.

Researched September 2026 — current as of Update 9.0 / Hotfix 9.0.1 and the Lords of the End Times DLC (released September 24, 2026). Live games change; check the linked sources if something differs.

Quick Start

• Play Immortal Empires, not only the Realm of Chaos story campaign. The Realm of Chaos campaign is a narrative introduction; Immortal Empires is the giant sandbox combining the maps and races of all three games, and where most players spend their time.
• Start with an "easy" Legendary Lord. Good first picks: Tzarina Katarin (Kislev), Miao Ying (Grand Cathay), Karl Franz (the Empire, if you have access to that race), or Skarbrand (Khorne) for pure aggression.
• Your economy wins wars. Build income buildings in your capital province first, and do not raise a second army until income can support it.
• Keep armies full. A half-stack is a liability. Aim for 16–20 units per army before campaigning far from home.
• Units have hard counters. Spears beat cavalry and monsters, cavalry beats archers and artillery, anti-infantry beats swarms. Mixed armies beat single-type armies.
• Protect your Lord in battle. Losing the general tanks army morale (Leadership).
• Autoresolve easy fights, play the close ones. Manual battles usually save more units than the autoresolve predicts.
• Use confederation and diplomacy. Many races can confederate same-race factions, instantly doubling your territory.
• Save before big battles and every few turns. Campaign crashes are rarer after Hotfix 9.0.1, but autosave slots rotate.

What Is New: Lords of the End Times (September 2026)

Lords of the End Times launched September 24, 2026 alongside the free Update 9.0. It is sold as four separate Legendary Lord packs (Nagash, Boris Todbringer, Thanquol, the Glottkin), or all four together as a bundle with a 15% discount.

Pack | Faction | Race | Legendary heroes | What stands out

Nagash | Host of Nagash | Undead Legions (new race) | Walach Harkon, Dieter Helsnicht | Mastery of every kind of undeath: draws on Tomb Kings, Vampire Counts and Vampire Coast rosters. CA calls it the most content ever given to a single character in the trilogy

Boris Todbringer | Middenland | The Empire | Emil Valgeir | Elector Count of Middenheim and champion of Ulric; a balanced mix of infantry, cavalry, artillery and magic, with a grudge against Khazrak One-Eye

The Glottkin | Host of the Triplets | Warriors of Chaos | Bloab Rotspawned, Gutrot Spume, Morbidex Twiceborn, Orghotts Daemonspew | Otto, Ethrac and Ghurk Glott, three Nurgle-marked brothers; a plague-focused Chaos warband

Grey Seer Thanquol | Clan Scruten | Skaven | Skreech Verminking | Magic-heavy Skaven campaign built around scheming "Masterplans"

What one pack gets you: Each pack includes its Legendary Lord with their new units and mechanics, a core roster for that lord's race, any free content for that race, the Immortal Empires campaign, the Warhammer III Prologue, and Bretonnia (with its four Legendary Lords) as a playable race in Immortal Empires. You play on the same full Immortal Empires map as veterans.

Free with Update 9.0 (for everyone):

• Neferata, a new Vampire Counts Legendary Lord leading the Lahmian Sisterhood, with her Web of Power menu. The Silver Pinnacle becomes a 10-slot settlement and gets a landmark that lets you recruit Lahmian Handmaidens and Lahmian Vampires early.
• A major Vampire Counts rework.
• Campaign AI changes: the AI now remembers failed recruitment attempts per army and moves on to other tasks, so AI armies should reach full strength faster and clump or idle less.

Hotfix 9.0.1 (September 26) fixed Web of Power crashes and input bugs, the Vermintide endgame auto-completing at 100% Knowledge, Underling armies disbanding after sally battles, untargetable settlements, and a Boris Todbringer keybind bug.

Entry point for new players: Creative Assembly's new-player FAQ (September 25, 2026) says you do not need to own Total War: WARHAMMER I, II or III: for new players, a Lords of the End Times pack works as your base game. Which pack to buy? Boris (Empire) is the most conventional army for learning the battle basics; Nagash has the most content but more mechanics to juggle. Races from the older games and other DLC still require owning that content.

The Campaign Map

Turn structure and resources

Resource | What it does | How to raise it

Gold (Treasury) | Buildings, recruitment, upkeep | Income buildings, trade, raiding, sacking

Public Order | Below zero causes rebellions | Garrison, commandments, buildings, low corruption

Growth | Upgrades settlement tier | Growth buildings and commandments

Corruption (Vampiric, Chaos, Skaven, etc.) | Lowers public order and causes attrition for non-matching armies | Heroes, buildings, your own faction's corruption

Race-specific resources | Devotion (Kislev), Harmony (Cathay), Skulls (Khorne), Souls, etc. | Each faction's unique mechanics

Provinces and buildings

• Each province has a capital (up to tier 5) and minor settlements (tier 3 cap in most cases).
• Complete a province to issue Commandments (a province-wide buff, e.g. +growth or +public order).
• A good capital build order: income building, recruitment building for your core infantry, walls/garrison if on a frontier, then growth and higher-tier recruitment.
• Minor settlements should specialize: resource or income buildings, plus one defensive building on borders.
• Do not build every recruitment building everywhere. One or two recruitment hubs are enough.

Armies on the campaign map

• Upkeep scales with army count. Every additional army raises the upkeep of all units, so a third half-stack is worse than two full ones.
• Stances: March (extra movement, vulnerable), Raiding (income from enemy or own land, slower), Encamp (faster replenishment), Ambush, plus race-specific stances (for example underground movement for Skaven, Dwarfs and Greenskins, or Beastpaths for Beastmen).
• Replenishment happens in your territory, faster in settlements and with encamp.
• Reinforcement: Armies adjacent to a battle join it. Use two armies to double-team AI stacks.
• Heroes can assassinate lords, reduce enemy public order, or embed in your armies for combat.

Diplomacy

• Early non-aggression pacts and trade agreements with neighbors buy time.
• Military alliances unlock after a positive relationship; allies can be asked to join wars and later confederated for some races.
• Watch the Global Threat / Relation modifiers; expanding very fast makes everyone dislike you.

Battles

Core rules

• Leadership (morale): Units rout when leadership breaks. Flanking, rear charges, losing the general and fear/terror all drain it.
• Charge bonus: Cavalry and monsters deal huge damage on the initial charge. Pull back and re-charge ("cycle charge") rather than leaving them stuck in melee.
• Ranged units need line of sight; artillery arcs over. Missile units are fragile in melee, so keep them behind your line.
• Magic: Casters draw from the Winds of Magic pool. Save your biggest spells for when enemies bunch up against your frontline.
• Siege battles: Attackers need siege equipment (rams, towers) unless they have monsters, fliers or artillery. Waiting a few turns lets you build it.

Unit counters

Your unit | Strong vs | Weak vs

Spear infantry (anti-large) | Cavalry, monsters | Heavy infantry, missiles

Armored infantry | Swordsmen, missiles | Armor-piercing, magic

Cavalry | Missiles, artillery, flanking | Spears, walls

Monsters | Infantry blobs | Spears, anti-large missiles

Artillery | Slow blobs, monsters | Fast cavalry, fliers

Fliers | Artillery, isolated casters | Anti-large missiles

A dependable beginner army

A classic "hammer and anvil": 6–8 frontline infantry (including spears), 4–6 missile units, 2–4 cavalry or fast monsters on the flanks, 1–2 artillery, your Lord and a caster Hero. Hold the enemy with the infantry, shoot while they are pinned, then charge cavalry into their flanks or rear.

Starting Factions: Who to Pick

Faction | Difficulty | Why

Tzarina Katarin (Kislev) | Easy | Strong ranged/infantry mix, clear start, great tutorial of mechanics

Miao Ying (Grand Cathay) | Easy | Excellent infantry and ranged, defensive play, Harmony keeps army balanced

Skarbrand (Khorne) | Easy-medium | Pure aggression; win by fighting

Ku'gath (Nurgle) | Medium | Slow but tanky, cyclic buildings

Kairos Fateweaver (Tzeentch) | Medium-hard | Manipulation mechanics, fragile units

Nagash (Undead Legions, new) | Varies | Newest race; learn it after you know the basics

Start on Normal campaign / Normal battle difficulty. Hard and above give the AI big income and aggression bonuses.

Your First 20 Turns (general template)

• Turn 1: Fight the scripted starting battle, recruit to fill your Lord's army, queue an income building in your capital.
• Turns 2–5: Take the closest hostile settlement to complete your home province. Complete provinces are worth much more than scattered ones.
• Turns 5–10: Issue a commandment, build a second income building, and sign trade/non-aggression deals with non-hostile neighbors.
• Turns 10–15: Recruit a second army only when income is comfortably positive. Add a Hero to each army.
• Turns 15–20: Pick one direction of expansion. Do not war on every front.

Endgame and Victory Conditions

• Short and Long Victory conditions differ per faction; check the Objectives panel.
• Endgame Scenarios (optional in Immortal Empires) spawn late-game crises: Vermintide (Skaven), the Black Pyramid (Nagash's undead), a Greenskin Waaagh!, the Wild Hunt, A Grudge Too Far, and others. Update 9.0 adjusted some of these; Hotfix 9.0.1 fixed Vermintide completing itself at 100% Knowledge without the final battle.
• Realm of Chaos campaign: Close Rifts, enter the four Chaos Realms (Khorne, Nurgle, Tzeentch, Slaanesh), collect Daemon Prince souls, and win the final battle at the Forge of Souls.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

• Too many armies too early. Upkeep penalty plus poor income equals bankruptcy and disbanding units.
• Ignoring public order. Rebellions spawn armies in your backline.
• Letting corruption run wild. Enemy corruption causes attrition and unrest; build anti-corruption buildings or use your own corruption type.
• Leaving settlements ungarrisoned. Walls and a garrison building stop hero-led raids.
• Sitting ranged units in front. They should shoot past your frontline, not form it.
• Charging cavalry into spears.
• Declaring war on allies' friends. Diplomacy has knock-on effects.

Advanced Tips

• Hotkey control groups (Ctrl+number) for infantry, missiles, cavalry and heroes.
• Use pause (Space by default) freely in single-player battles.
• Lure AI into missile fire by retreating your frontline briefly; the AI will chase.
• Sack and raze instead of occupying settlements you cannot hold; it funds your campaign.
• Tech tree: prioritize economy and upkeep-reduction techs early.
• Lord skill trees: Early points into the red line (army buffs) or campaign line (public order/income) are usually stronger than personal combat skills.
• Mods via Steam Workshop are extremely popular; disable them before major patches like 9.0, then re-enable once updated.

FAQ

Do I need Warhammer I and II to play Immortal Empires? Historically you needed the earlier games for their races. Per Creative Assembly's September 2026 FAQ, buying any one Lords of the End Times pack is now enough to start Immortal Empires, and it also makes Bretonnia playable; other races still depend on the content you own.

What does Lords of the End Times add? The Undead Legions race led by Nagash, plus Boris Todbringer (Empire), The Glottkin (Warriors of Chaos) and Grey Seer Thanquol (Skaven), each with legendary heroes. Neferata and a Vampire Counts rework are free with Update 9.0.

Which Lords of the End Times pack should I buy first? Pick the army you want to play. Boris is the most straightforward; Nagash has the most content; Thanquol and the Glottkin suit players who like Skaven scheming or Nurgle attrition. The bundle is 15% cheaper than buying all four.

Which faction is best for beginners? Kislev (Tzarina Katarin) or Grand Cathay (Miao Ying).

Is multiplayer worth it? Yes: head-to-head Domination 1v1, ranked and custom battles, and co-op campaigns including an 8-player Realm of Chaos campaign.

Why is the AI stacking armies and not attacking? Update 9.0 specifically targeted AI army clumping and idle behaviour; if you still see it, verify files and disable outdated mods.

Should I autoresolve? For lopsided wins yes; for close fights, play manually.

Sources

• Steam news: Total War: WARHAMMER III
• Lords of the End Times is OUT NOW / Update 9.0 (Steam announcement)
• Steam news API feed for Total War: WARHAMMER III (Lords of the End Times, Neferata, New Player FAQ posts)
• Total War: Warhammer III (Wikipedia)
• Total War official site