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We spoke to Total War developer Creative Assembly about the upcoming Lords of the End Times, listening to players and striving to make the best game possible.
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00:11Hi, I'm Andy Brown from GamesRadar and today I am with Game Director Rich and Design Director
00:18Sean and we're going to be talking about Warhammer 3 and the End Times. Every single time that I have
00:23done these interviews I have asked about Nagash and we've just seen that he's actually finally
00:27come into the game so how do you feel? Oh we're really excited he's been one of the characters
00:32that we wanted to do for all the time I've been working on this series and he brings godly levels
00:39of power if you like into the game and yeah lots of fun to be had with him. Yeah so
00:44I mean for me
00:45from a design point of view it's really exciting to do Nagash at these completely different from
00:50the other undead which is like a great design space to really capture him and bring him to life as
00:54the great necromancer that he is so it's a cool opportunity. And I mean bringing him in through
01:01those End Times there was quite a controversial thing for GW the way that Games Workshop handled
01:06that how are you sort of making it your own because I saw a little bit about sort of respecting
01:10that
01:10sandbox formula. So the the big take home for us is that we're taking inspiration from the End Times so
01:16it's called the Lords of the End Times rather than the End Times we're not trying to tell the definitive
01:22narrative that the setting had we're just taking the the great moments and playing homage to the
01:29characters and what makes them special in this setting so Nagash's principle but behind behind this
01:36bringing a you know law of undeath trying trying to kill the world if you like and have and have
01:43fun
01:44with that. So yeah that's that's the angle that we're taking. Yeah I think the only thing to add
01:51there is like Rich says we're inspired by but ultimately it's the sandbox it's Total War as you
01:56know it so the motivations the amazing features like the key moments that you go oh man that's so
02:02amazing that our character did that that's where we're drawing our inspiration from to make our own
02:07version of how would that look in Total War and what would be a fun experience with ultimately the
02:12player deciding how is the world shaped you know through your actions does it end the same way
02:17probably slightly differently depending on who you're playing as right so we're fully what was
02:22cool about the End Times what can we draw on and then it's up to the player to to take
02:26that Total War
02:27experience forwards. And I mean from what I've seen it feels like a little bit of a full circle moment
02:32because it looks a little bit like the way the End Times were sort of touched on in the first
02:36Warhammer
02:36game where Chaos comes out of sort of the north at the end. Is that something that feels like a
02:40full circle
02:41moment for both of you is that I feel like sort of tackling the same theme years down the line?
02:47There's some similarities Chaos is is kind of the big bad there's there's no good guys in this world
02:54but Chaos is the ultimate big bad and we wanted to have that element in Warhammer one for sure
02:59without them it'd feel very weird. This one is about really supercharging some of these characters
03:06that we expect to see in this period of time having a lot of fun with them so there might
03:11be some
03:12similarities but it's definitely its own thing and it's definitely like chance to really experience
03:16these these characters and what makes them special.
03:19Yeah I think it's a it's a good observation of how Warhammer one Archeon really did feel like this was
03:24the end of the of the world this was a big moment I think in Warhammer three we're seeing that
03:29right now
03:30that's not there as well so as part of like was working on Nagash and the other parts of this
03:34experience
03:35we do want to make sure we capture that like sense of there is a big moment that you're working
03:39towards and you will feel like your campaign has a climax now so we are definitely maybe full circle
03:45and going back to why did it work so well there and how can we capture that fantasy again.
03:51Amazing and the roundtable mentioned it would be Order, Chaos, Undead are the other two factions are
03:57they going to have their own sort of narratives like sort of story the same way Nagash sort of
04:02collects himself and brings about the end of the world or is it is Nagash sort of like the star
04:06of
04:06the show this time around? I mean I would say so we are trying to act on feedback in the
04:12past where
04:12we'd done lesser than that so making sure that every character has their own clear motivations and
04:17that's why they want to take part of Nagash's motivations are really clear and they really
04:21align with what the end times is about of wanting to turn the world into an undead realm where he's
04:26basically the supreme god that's what he wants to do or other characters will have equally
04:30appropriate motivations and try to conclude the campaign in their own way. Mechanics wise he uses
04:36so he draws on like several different factions how have you sort of leaned in and still made
04:42sure that Nagash is central to it without feeling like sort of drawn too heavily on the other factions?
04:48so he is his fully owned culture so we are going what what is Nagash what is his motivations and
04:54how
04:55does he tackle the world first rather than go well how does you know vampire counts work or how do
04:59tomb kings work we want to make sure that it feels like there becomes this amalgamation moment of like
05:04he is the ultimate force of the undead but we are starting from who's Nagash not what's come before
05:10and making sure that we our players expectations of oh this is how the vampire counts work and this is
05:15how
05:15recruitment works and what have you we're we're questioning those rules of is that appropriate
05:19for Nagash like we know he's he's going to have a huge roster what's the best way to make that
05:24work
05:24so again we'll acknowledge what's come before but it's about Nagash. Yeah yeah he's he's very much
05:31you know all encompassing all of this and for me it's quite nice going but it feels like going back
05:37to
05:37some of the really old army books when it was just the undead and that's very much where we start
05:41this
05:42position from like he's his faction so we're not um looking to just take elements from the other
05:47three and splice them together like we're going to start start fresh and clean for him and give him
05:51the the podium to to be on that he deserves. That's what I like to hear I think you touched
05:56on narrative
05:57earlier and I think it's quite interesting looking across the last two Warhammer games in particular
06:01because I mean the first game started off with you had those sort of like the apocalypse with Archeon
06:06but then even in the DLC you had I'm remembering the Beastmen like sort of mini campaign that was a
06:10lot more
06:10narratively focused and then it's felt like two and three have sort of worked out where you get the
06:15narrative and the sandbox balance right so where are you feeling like you're at now with it do you feel
06:19like players have value in the narrative aspect more than maybe they did in the first game or is it
06:23just
06:24a constant iteration? It's definitely been a learning curve right Total War is obviously a sandbox game
06:30and so we need to allow for that but Warhammer obviously has such a rich narrative characters doing
06:36particular things and interactions and story building so we've we've obviously tried a few
06:40things over the years as you've seen some have been more favorable than than others and we stayed away
06:46from some of the the big campaigns that we did as much as we enjoyed making them for the Beastmen
06:50and
06:51what else but we've tried to reintroduce some of this back in the latest DLCs so that it doesn't take
06:56away
06:57from the sandbox but you can play a bit in and enrich in that experience if you choose to do
07:01so
07:01so we're still taking inspiration learnings from that and seeing what everyone's enjoying
07:06um hopefully they still are if things crop up then we'll try and make adjustments to that
07:11um but ultimately we want to allow you to get to what you want to do in this world and
07:16maybe that is
07:17going everywhere or going something specific meeting a certain character and uh giving giving players
07:22that that choice and uh and opportunity I guess okay so one thing that every single time I've asked
07:29about Nagash I think something that's come up is like yeah but how would you do Nagash like without
07:34being this strong and I think over the course of that trilogy a lot of the characters and races have
07:39become a lot stronger is this a way of sort of leaning into that power creep and being like you
07:45want to
07:45deliver that fantasy or have you sort of considered how to balance it for maybe more experienced players
07:50who want that challenge yeah I think it's a tough one I think the the core thing that uh we
07:55try to do when
07:55we design all aspects of the game is to make sure there's experiences for different players as well
08:00so that's why sometimes you you might see an experience that's slightly on the easier side
08:03for our really experienced veterans because the fantasy of that character was like maybe they do
08:08have an easier time where we are with the inspiration from the end times obviously how
08:12Nagash is specifically resurrected in the end times puts him straight at that pedestal of like he's
08:17already at his his uber powerfulness we're not necessarily saying that he's going to come in at that
08:22that full level there and part of that's from a from a game design perspective perspective of like
08:27you want the sense of progression if you come in at 100 then there's nowhere to go
08:31so we want to make sure there is room for him to grow and obviously that the fantasy is he
08:36will be
08:36incredibly powerful himself but how his faction plays and how that is uh you know balanced by what
08:41his campaign mechanics require him to do I don't think we're necessarily going to say like oh he's
08:46definitely going to be really crazy powerful and it's never our intention to make things overpowered but
08:51we're still figuring out exactly how that lands one thing I would always say and most designers
08:57would probably share is that design never survives contact with the game so all of our best intentions
09:03once it's in there and we start playing it we'll figure out which way do we go do we go
09:06left do we go
09:07right is it too easy is it too hard and ultimately is it capturing the fantasy so uh it's early
09:13to say
09:14where exactly he'll land in the power streak but we'll we'll make sure he feels like Nagash
09:19yeah yeah and that's our ultimate goal we want the characters to resonate and feel like what
09:23you and everybody else at home expects them to be like um as sean says we've been we've been
09:28developing so long now and changing and bringing new characters bringing a character like this is
09:34naturally going to make some other people's start positions much much harder um now now he's here so
09:39um it's definitely a balance in that and one that we enjoy doing and getting feedback and continuing to
09:44build build up and so i've gone that a little bit deeper one thing i've noticed over the course of
09:51the trilogy is that as the scope and ambition of faction new factions new lords and their mechanics
09:56has increased some of them do just naturally feel a lot more powerful but they also feel a lot more
10:02interesting so i think a really good balance between them all i remember was chaos dwarves it's the way
10:06you had the sort of like faction economy but you didn't it wasn't necessarily always rewarding to work
10:11within that how do you sort of make mechanics that are deeper that are more interesting
10:17without just giving someone the tools to do everything at once because i think that's quite
10:21that sounds like a really difficult challenge yeah it is difficult i think chaos dwarves is one of the
10:26best examples of we had the opportunity to create that depth and space because we were starting from
10:32a blank page in terms of they weren't already in the game it's a lot easier to build tools around
10:37like oh how do we make this you know work well with other places when we've done our reworks we've
10:42always tried to make sure that yes we add that depth and we don't make the game you know too
10:48easy
10:48in spaces but ultimately if you're providing a tool if the tool is enjoyable and good you are naturally
10:55going to be more powerful that's why it's generally more difficult to to get that right balance when
10:59we're doing something that has a starting point and with nagash because we are making him his own
11:03culture his own thing he's not a vampire count or a tomb king he is nagash it does give us
11:09that room
11:09to have this depth of mechanics without worrying about well we've already got this thing that exists
11:14we can't remove that how do we work around it we've got a fresh space again to to build up
11:19hopefully
11:19something as deep and interesting as chaos dwarves yeah we've definitely enjoyed working on those i think
11:25of order i forget how many DLCs we've made now quite a few but the ones that we've certainly enjoyed
11:30working on is when we bring a new uh faction to life so things like chaos dwarves and i think
11:35with
11:36nagash falling into that that kind of same space being his his own um yeah there's lots of room for
11:42us to play around and try some new and in innovative things um and yeah hopefully land something really
11:49really fun amazing and i guess if we go to a bigger picture perspective what are the key lessons if
11:57you
11:57got to condense them down that you've learned through the trilogy that you feel have really
12:01culminated in a lot of the end times i mean we sort of touched on one earlier which is how
12:05do you get
12:05the flavor of the law into it without taking away the sandbox experience so we've been working on ways in
12:12which we can fulfill that fantasy um but not not railroad you into certain things and going through
12:19um certain hoops i think that's been a big big one um we've learned a lot again about the fantasy
12:26of
12:26people like mixing the matching stuff so anywhere possible we'd like to reach out to games workshop
12:30and say how can we make sure that these these things are cross pollinating between the various
12:34different races if it's appropriate that's been a really good good one um we recognize still all of
12:41them aren't i now um around kind of making sure that each uh major faction has got at least um
12:47a melee
12:48focused character and a casting focus character to write those different elements of game gameplay and then
12:55from that give them a feature which resonates their personality um they've been they've been
13:00strong suits and yeah it's been one one heck of a journey i think the the big thing especially since
13:06we've touched on narrative and these things previously is we've always been inspired by what
13:10the character's feature should be and what their play style is but in you know the recent years
13:14we've seen that actually the motivations of the character and what their goals are in a campaign is
13:18equally something that we need to to bring to life here to to have that sense of like i know
13:23why i'm
13:23engaging with the game i know what my goals are and this feels appropriate for the character rather
13:27than i have a cool mechanic but the game actually isn't telling me where to go with the mechanics
13:32that's something we've definitely taken on board and we're taking this into the final dlc as well
13:36i think the other thing that you know is is part of the journey we're only really talking to gash
13:41today
13:41but with our other characters is appreciating the space that they already exist in within their
13:46culture so you know when we've done other characters in a very well fleshed out culture there's a lot
13:52more room to do something new because there's this space there when we've done uh like let's take
13:58like the changing for example there was only one others each experience so we've gone really very
14:03different with changing which was a great experience but for people who just wanted a new start position
14:08within this each space that was like oh we didn't quite take that so we're really considering how many
14:13lords are in the cultures and that is helping us gauge what's the complexity what's the starting state
14:18where do we go with it so lots of lessons over the last however many years we've been making this
14:24now
14:24um and yeah it will all come together in the lord of the end times so lords of the end
14:29times
14:29yeah you you remind me actually that was one of the first ones that we that we changed was uh
14:33giving
14:34characters their unique starting positions you think right back to warhammer 1 they were shared
14:38carwin and girl completely forgot about that yeah yeah so this is all great feedback that we've taken
14:43on board from all the players because i know everyone loves it and they've got their favorites
14:47and uh yeah that was that was a big one even though the massive map that we got with so
14:52many
14:52characters now they're all fighting for that space and that and that dominance but it's been fun
14:57and because you mentioned the changel and i've noticed with warhammer generally people seem to want
15:03very different things from dlc we touched on players want a different challenge but some people may
15:07have more of a preference for which units come in some people are more about the campaign mechanics
15:12how do you i think you put it best early maybe that nothing really survives contact with the players
15:18like how do you consider that when you are in like the sort of draft and in production stage of
15:21dlc how do
15:22you cater to so many different sort of players um we like to go after a theme um thankfully with
15:32years worth of material there's some really really strong characters out there with some really
15:37solid backgrounds behind them so we like to lean into that to start out and build out the the
15:41thematics of the pack um the gas is no different right in this in in this one so we're looking
15:47at
15:47what are the main driving factors of them what is the supporting cost what kind of units
15:51would make sense now not not always is there enough to fulfill to fill that so then we're looking at
15:57the next level of things or we're looking at more supplementary uh magazines and uh and law books
16:04and and the like and that's the angle that we want to take on and then how does that sit
16:08differently
16:09from all the other characters that we've got currently in the game um what can they do that
16:14this one that no one else can do or is there a rule that maybe that we can challenge and
16:19maybe break
16:20and let the players have a different experience with so that's that's where we like to set set things
16:24out yeah from from like a really early inception process as well for for us in design we start with
16:31let's read everything we can let's like consume everything we can about these these characters
16:36these cultures everything and we work with our player experience team as well to see like what is
16:40the community's expectation going in because you know you you can read all about nagash and go well
16:45we've interpreted it this way but with big characters like nagash players have been talking about him for
16:51years so do our does the fantasy that we've built up from reading about them match with what players
16:56are expecting and almost always it does because like the identities are so strong but in a couple
17:02of places we go oh that's really interesting that people are expecting such an such an experience
17:06whatever it is and we will try to go okay how can we make sure that we're covering people's
17:11expectations there so there is there is a a process of let's get excited let's find our fantasy
17:16make sure that we can confirm that with the players expectations and then we have that as our
17:20guiding like this is the fantasy we want to make and as we we come up with designs we put
17:25features
17:25in sometimes they we go you know our greatest barometer of success is are we achieving that
17:31fantasy and if you're having fun but you're not achieving the fantasy then even then there's
17:35something that we have to question which is why like i say you know not all features survive contact
17:39with the game because it could be a great feature but it's not quite right for what you were trying
17:43to create so we're always going through that iterative process yeah and the other thing just
17:48just just to clarify as well is we're obviously working very closely against workshop and all
17:53this at all times and characters like nagash they've got a long-standing history there's different
17:58miniatures different what you know ways in which he's represented so we're making sure that we're
18:01getting the authentic version that is right for now in a period of time that we're telling
18:05in um our version of warhammer which is essentially the eighth edition um so again it's taking that
18:13that inspiration making sure that we're authentic to that and sometimes that means that things maybe
18:17don't come out quite to everybody's imagination and expectations but hopefully we can communicate
18:24why that is and um and make sure that the version that we are doing is right for the period
18:29of time
18:29that we are making and i mean when i think of warhammer 3 now i think the only real sort
18:36of issues that
18:37players or at least the big ones that i see mostly are around sort of maybe much more ingrained things
18:42like siege battles things like that that people would like to see improvements on and i know the team
18:46has been quite open about the development about working towards improvements there like how is that
18:50factored into lords of the end times like are you working to improve that before you're looking at
18:56release or is that just going to be a bigger picture issue i think there's going to be some
19:00things that are just ever going ever present um that we want to try and try and take forward want
19:05to try and remedy things like sieges everyone's got their own kind of tastes um and we know that
19:11some people prefer some of the way we do things in the past some people prefer ways at the moment
19:16some people want something different in between so we're taking baby steps on on that but we're not
19:22we're not shying away from it we're just trying to take the appropriate actions when it
19:25when when it can be done done so and same with other parts of the game um we want to
19:31fix what
19:32there is to already play play with so that's that's something that we're looking to do at the
19:36moment so people can enjoy what they've already purchased um and then yeah i'm sure laws at the
19:42end times will bring along some some new flavors some new things some new toys um and again that
19:46will set us on the course forward uh past this great great moment in time really
19:53yeah i think i mean since you call out the sieges like we obviously had the beta we've taken a
19:57lot
19:57of lessons from that and that has now gone to our can we make this objectively an improvement for the
20:02game and that's not obviously a simple uh task as rich said there's lots of opinions there's lots of
20:07ways that people would like to see us tackle this and it is a big task it's kind of a
20:12boring answer to
20:13some degree of like when will it come as it's just when can we give it the attention that it
20:17needs
20:17with you know the people we have and the timelines that we have i think there's also something to be
20:21said of to get somewhat science like we need some control we need some level of like baseline to work
20:27from so as we're developing uh loads of the end times we need to make sure okay this is the
20:32game
20:32that we know it is it's not in flux too much so we can make the best experience if you've
20:37got too
20:37many different levers being moved at the same time it can make it quite hard to make sure you're nailing
20:42the right experience overall so we'll we'll find the right spot to make sure that the changes are
20:48the positive changes that the game needs when that is uh is up to jean's i suppose uh yeah we've
20:58got
20:58lots of things to consider now lots of parts to make sure they're all working and uh and yeah we
21:03want we want things to be working for everyone so they can enjoy it
21:12you
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