WHII DLC and WHIII Faction Speculation
This thread is meant to provide speculation exactly on what the future DLC factions of TW Warhammer II will be and what we might expect from TW Warhammer III. There are many threads on whether or not particular races will appear as factions in the future, this thread is meant to discuss not just one race, but rather all of them.
We know that the first game featured the Old World and the second game featured the New World, the Southlands, Ulthuan and Albion. We can assume that the third game will be set in the areas not covered in the previous two games, which roughly equals to the same size as the map of Warhammer II. Looking at the world map we can deduce what factions can still be added as DLC in Warhammer II and what factions may be present in the future TW Warhammer III title.
1. Official armies:
The Creative Assembly at one point said that they would like to include all of the official Warhammer armies in their three Warhammer games. The current official armies, separated below on which part of the map/game they are located, are as follows:
TW Warhammer I:
The Empire
Dwarfs
Vampire Counts
Greenskins
Warriors of Chaos
Wood Elves
Beastmen
Bretonnia
TW Warhammer II:
Dark Elves
Lizardmen
Skaven
High Elves
Tomb Kings
TW Warhammer III:
Ogre Kingdoms
Chaos Dwarfs
Daemons of Chaos
There are several other official armies which are merely the armies of other factions combined as well, but these will most likely not be featured in any of the games so I won’t include them in this thread.
2. Discontinued official armies:
There are also several official armies that have now become discontinued, excluding the armies that are now obsolete (i.e. the Slann as they’ve become part of the Lizardmen) or simply combination of other ones, they are as follows:
TW Warhammer I:
Kislev
Dogs of War
TW Warhammer II:
Araby
3. Unofficial armies
On top of that there are the unofficial armies, who originally were not always official releases but over the years have had armies, miniatures, rules and/or lore designed for them, these are as follows:
TW Warhammer I:
Norsca
Fimir
Zoat
Half-Orcs
Halflings
Gnomes
TW Warhammer II:
Albion
Amazons
Pygmies
Vampire Coast
TW Warhammer III:
Hobgoblins
Ind
Cathay
Nippon
4. Remaining factions
We have seen that Norsca/Fimir have been added as a playable faction in TW Warhammer I, so the Creative Assembly adding more unofficial factions to the games is not out of the question. However, with the release of Warhammer II I don’t really see Warhammer I getting more DLC factions added to it. That means that the aforementioned factions plus any other likes Kislev and Estalia/Border princes are unlikely to get released in the future. That leaves us with several factions that could still be added to TW Warhammer II and TW Warhammer III:
TW Warhammer II:
Tomb Kings, Araby, Albion, Amazons, Pygmies and Vampire Coast
TW Warhammer III:
Ogre Kingdoms, Chaos Dwarfs, Daemons of Chaos, Hobgoblins, Ind, Cathay and Nippon
On top of this there are two other factions in the lore that could make an appearance in TW Warhammer III, these are the snake men of Khuresh and the High Elves of Elithis. This gives the game at least 9 possible factions and thus enough to go on. Little is known about the armies or lore of these factions meaning they’re not very fleshed out and thus less likely to be featured in any Warhammer game. However, I don’t really see what other direction the Creative Assembly can go. The part of the Warhammer world where these factions are located will be the only area that hasn’t been included in any of the games yet and thus is the most likely candidate for the third game. As I can’t say anything else to confirm the potential setting and factions of the third TW Warhammer III game, I’m just going to examine what DLC can be added to TW Warhammer II.
i) Tomb Kings:
As this is an official army, which the CA said they wanted to include in the games, it’s pretty much certain that they will make an appearance in TW WHII. Like what was the case with many factions in the previous few Total War games, their units are currently just generic Vampire Counts unit placeholders who will get updated and replaced when they get released as a playable faction.
ii) Araby
It’s quite possible that when the Tomb Kings get released as DLC they will be joined by Araby. This faction used to be an official army and is therefore fully fleshed out with fairly unique units and lore, making them a likely candidate. Furthermore, they are next to the Tomb Kings and so probably could be released alongside them much like the Wood Elves and Beastmen were. The only reasons I don’t see Araby getting included is they were not in the main game at release and their land has been given to other factions, but again Wood Elves and Beastmen were not on the map either at the launch of TW Warhammer I so who knows. Another reason Araby might not be included is because of political correctness, as they’re quite literally based on Arab people and their mythology. However, pretty much every faction in Warhammer is based on some real life culture, so it probably won’t be the deciding factor on whether they get in or not.
iii) Albion
I’m not sure if we’ll see Albion as a playable faction, but it’s definitely possible. We know that the CA as a British company is a sucker for British history, and Albion is based on British history and folklore. Furthermore, we know about what units they would have but they’re currently not even included in the game as a NPC faction and their land has been given to a Norsca faction. This may be a good sign as it could indicate that the CA wants to include them as a faction only after they’ve fleshed them out with their own unique units and style of gameplay.
iv) Amazons
We will probably not see this faction in the game, it was not included as an NPC faction and would need a complete and unique overhaul. Furthermore it was never an official faction and has very few units and lore, meaning there’s not much to go with making them an unlikely candidate.
v) Pygmies
This faction is very unlikely, little is known about their units and lore, and they were discontinued decades ago because they were so politically incorrect. If these stereotypical pygmies were considered politically incorrect then, it’s pretty much safe to say that there’s no way in hell they would be included in a game in the 21st century.
vi) Vampire Coast
This is a likely candidate, actually. The Vampire Coast not only has lore but a fleshed out army, as well as units and features that would make for a completely unique playing style. Not only are they a fan favorite but employees of the Creative Assembly have said in the past that they like undead factions, meaning they’re more likely to be chosen to be included as a DLC faction. Plus, they seem to do well in pretty much every game I’ve played in TW Warhammer II. Their dominance means they might not be intended to be a minor faction forever. More importantly, Luthor Harkon is not included in the game currently, which means he will most likely get released at some point when the faction’s units have been overhauled, and is currently still being worked on. This is reminiscent of the Bretonnia and Norsca factions which were released with placeholders for a long time in the previous game. Zombie pirates with a focus on gunpowder weapons is a pretty cool sounding idea, but some players have said that they’re not sure on how these could be implemented effectively. I think it could work rather well actually, as it stands their units are as follows:
Legendary Lord: Luthor Harkon (great at raising undead but bad at magic)
Heroes: Fleet captains, sirens
Infantry: Zombie pirate deckhands mob, zombie pirates gunnery mob, bloated corpses, scurvy dogs, deck gunners
Special units: Deck droppers, razortooth rats
Artillery: carronade, Queen Bess (hell-hammer canon)
Monster units: animated hulks, rotting leviathan (sea dragon or giant crab or kraken)
Maybe adding zombie spearmen, some more zombie infantry with varying ranks and weapons, i.e. undead corsairs, undead reavers, undead buccaneers, etc. Maybe some more special units like an ethereal siren unit, a vampire pirate unit as well as more canons and some giant monster units like giant crustaceans and undead sea dragons would complete it. Perhaps even some revived undead lizardmen? In short, there is a lot of potential here.
vii) Skeggi
Lastly, I think there’s a possibility we’ll see Skeggi implemented as a playable faction. The fact that the Creative Assembly decided to include Norsca as a last-ditch addition to TW Warhammer I as a pre-order bonus for TW Warhammer II means that they were probably thinking of including a playable Norsca faction for Warhammer II at some point. Furthermore in the lore their armies are supposed to be a mix of Norsca and Empire units I think, which might explain why they haven’t been giving generic Norsca units right now. Taking this into account, they currently don’t even have standard Norsca units but just generic chaos placeholders which means they’re getting their units revamped at some point. This is a good indication they might become playable or at the very least get updated. Their proximity to Hexotl could be seen as interesting but this might get in the way of making them a playable faction as one of these two factions will always eliminate the other.
So in conclusion, my verdict based on all the evidence is:
Tomb Kings – certain
Araby – most likely
Vampire coast – likely
Albion - possibly
Skeggi – possibly
Amazons – probably not
Pygmy – definitely not
In short this means we’ll probably get the Tomb Kings and Araby as our first DLC, and maybe the Vampire Coast and Skeggi added later as a kind of corsair or raider faction DLC.
Anyway sorry for the long ass post guys, if there’s something I haven’t taken into account or any information or ideas anyone has on the factions or future DLC, please share it with the rest of us.
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) and Skaven. Now TK make sense especially if CA is saying that first DLC race won´t feature minicampaign but instead 4 LL. Skavens are in fact also nice possibility for second DLC as the no minicampaign feature was meant to be only for first DLC....Skavens definitely offer a lot of content and due to the fact that for any good depiction of Under-Empire and Skaven inner/outer conflict we need either Old World or Mortal Empires campaign map...so minicampaign will offer such content for owners of only WH2 while expanding Skavens in Mortal Empires for owners of both games.
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Originally Posted by Påsan
