Total War: Warhammer 3 – Omens of Destruction review: Maim! Kill! Destroy!

The holy trinity of slaughter makes for a fantastic DLC

Creative Assembly / Sega

Omens of Destruction, the latest DLC for Total War: Warhammer 3, is built on the lessons that Creative Assembly has learned over the course of this year – primarily from the excellent DLC that is Thrones of Decay. Similar to that expansion, players have the option of purchasing OoD as a complete bundle containing all three Legendary Lords it brings to the game or buying any characters individually. Oh, and what a collection of characters we’re getting with this one.

There is Gorbad Ironclaw, essentially the Orcs’ Alexander the Great and the rare member of his species with more than a single braincell. There is Skulltaker, a Daemon of Khorne that can be compared to General Grievous from Star Wars thanks to their shared passion of collecting the trophies left behind by their vanquished enemies – both are the angry type, too. Finally, we have one of the most famous Ogres in Warhammer Fantasy, the globetrotting mercenary leader Golgfag Maneater, who’s bringing unprecedented freedom and riches to your campaign.

All three come with new units and unique faction mechanics that we’ll take a closer look at, but it’s worth noting that OoD will be accompanied by yet another massive free update for the title, which contains major reworks for all three involved races on top of a free Legendary Lord in Arbaal the Undefeated – who, fittingly, hits the “Game Over” screen upon losing a battle or gets renamed to Arbaal the Defeated and must fight his former patron, Khorne, to avenge his shame. That little tidbit alone should already show one vital aspect of OoD: In terms of flavor and mechanical innovation, it sees eye to eye with Thrones of Decay.

Playing Omens of Destructions was an intriguing prospect for me personally, because I actually bounced off of all three races represented in the DLC when they were initially introduced due to their playstyles – Orcs, Daemons of Khorne, and Ogres are all very aggressive in battle and the campaign. I usually enjoy a defensive style much more – ordered ranks of heavy infantry, guns, artillery, you know the drill. So it was a welcome surprise indeed that OoD not only changed my opinion on our aggressive friends, it had me chant “Kill for Khorne! Kill for Khorne!” by the end.

Skulltaker

U’Zhul Skulltaker leads the Daemons of Khorne. / Creative Assembly / Sega

Let’s start with Skulltaker, then, who’s giving us our first Daemons of Chaos campaign in Lustria. Both Skulltaker and Golgfag have victory conditions that are independent of territory, which frees you from the need of taking and holding as much ground as you can – from painting the map. If you want, that is, since the option is still there for you in both cases. 

Skulltaker’s victory is connected to his unique mechanic, the Cloak of Skulls, which provides unique upgrades to him as you empower it with Champion Essence obtained from defeating enemy lords in battle. See, he doesn’t care about settlements very much. Aside from razing them to collect favor and skulls and meet his second victory condition, this Daemon is more interested in seeking the strongest possible enemy and challenging them on the field. Lords’ Champion Essence increases as they gain XP and win battles, which in turn means that the mightiest foes become Skulltaker’s most attractive targets.

It sometimes seems like they know that, too, because the AI keeps trying its best to run away from confrontations with Skulltaker, leading to wild chases across provinces – and any player probably knows how capable the AI is at exploiting the Forced March stance to evade battles. This can be a frustrating drawback when playing as Skulltaker, but the developers have given him a tool to counter that: One of his Cloak of Skulls upgrades enables him to teleport to any enemy lord in sight, as long as he has enough Champion Essence stored up to pay for it.

This cloak is more than a fashion statement. / Creative Assembly / SEGA

Combined with upgrades that enable Skulltaker to gain some of the XP of defeated lords and restore some of his movement range after winning battles, he has the potential to become an absolute powerhouse very quickly.

The overall changes made to the Daemons of Khorne figure heavily into his kit, as he’s likely been designed from the ground up with these in mind – Skulltaker can, for example, buff the odds of daemonic units being restored to life after battle, in case they’ve fallen. Together with other buffs for daemons and general boosts to army replenishment, Skulltaker’s force is one with high mobility and endurance, which is perfect for long campaigns of hunting enemy lords.

A major factor in this is the fact that settlements razed by Khorne can’t be re-occupied for a number of turns. This allows for corruption to kick in and keeps the space open for longer. It really is a phenomenal sight to behold Skulltaker and one or two Blood Hosts advancing into hostile domains, leaving behind nothing but smoking ruins and devastation – and bodies that lack their skulls, presumably. Khorne’s passive colonization mechanics allow you to expand your own realm naturally along those invasion routes, if you want, but as long as you possess one well-built province for recruitment purposes Skulltaker can essentially forego any further territorial acquisitions.

Changes made to the economy and Blood Hosts also mean that you’re not as rushed to seek battle as before, which I think is partly why I’ve found myself enjoying the experience so much – there is still that intense incentive to be aggressive, but you can do so more on your own terms and there are very clear rewards associated with victories in the form of skulls, which are used for the reworked Skull Throne mechanic, and Champion Essence.

Golgfag Maneater

Golgfag Maneater leads the Ogre Kingdoms. / Creative Assembly / Sega

Golgfag Maneater provides another unorthodox campaign experience that can be played wholly without conquering any territory, for Golgfag is a pure mercenary. His entire deal is taking on a contract from another faction and fighting against its enemies for some time. Defeating armies, assassinating agents, sabotaging settlements, and taking territory provides Client Satisfaction. Reaching a certain level of satisfaction inside the contract’s time limit allows you to complete it, gaining massive amounts of riches as well as Meat, the vital resource for Ogres. During those campaigns, you can either take settlements for yourself, raze them, or give them to your client, which naturally is worth quite a lot of satisfaction.

More importantly, this essentially allows you to play kingmaker wherever you are – for example, you can spend your entire playthrough in one region of the world, keeping the balance of power between the various factions there on a stable level, which ensures that you’ll continue to get lucrative contract offers from all sides. If one side wins, your source of revenue dries up – keep the fires of war stoked, however, and the income keeps rolling in. Of course, you can also trot the globe as you accept contracts, moving continents and making a name for yourself in all four corners of the world.

This is made possible by the fact that once a contract is done, you get to make peace with all involved factions and reset your relationship with them – after all, fighting against them never was anything personal and a pure business transaction, right? As such, you’re always free to move about and even make deals with your previous enemies. It’s one of the best mercenary experiences I’ve ever had in a video game – it’s a really well executed power fantasy.

The greater the opposition, the better the pay. / Creative Assembly / SEGA

Golgfag, of course, comes with a kit to support this playstyle – he can greatly increase the loot gained after battles (going without territory, you’ll mostly run on a deficit), gain movement range after winning battles, and boost his army replenishment. He shares many characteristics with Skulltaker, in this regard, as their playstyle is somewhat comparable. One minor wrinkle is that while Golgfag has buffs for Regiments of Renown, which is very fitting for a mercenary, he can’t recruit them without being on his own territory just like everyone else, which is forcing you to take over settlements from time to time, in case you want to get any of these powerful special troops.

When I initially tried the Ogre Kingdoms at launch, I found their hunger mechanic too punishing for my liking. The rework of Meat in this expansion has completely negated those feelings. You still want to win battles to loot Meat, but your armies won’t immediately melt away if you pause for one or two turns to reform and regroup. Indeed, it feels like CA has moved from punishing players to rewarding them: Having lots of Meat stored up provides strong passive bonuses to armies. It’s also needed to build up Ogre Camps, to which you can transfer Meat manually, giving you much more control over your economy. You can also redeploy these camps now, which of course complements Golgfag’s potential globetrotting.

Mercenary Contracts and the reworked Bounty feature give you very clear campaign goals that can be achieved with or without painting the map. Personally, I greatly enjoyed having outposts within single-region provinces I could use as bases while essentially playing with only Golgfag’s army and a horde of agents, which can be used to quickly shore up Client Satisfaction. Another massive quality-of-life improvement is that Golgfag can teleport his army to one of his client’s cities once per contract, allowing you to take on work from the other side of the world without complications. If a mercenary fantasy at all appeals to you, then this faction is a riot.

Gorbad Ironclaw

Gorbad Ironclaw leads the Greenskins. / Creative Assembly / Sega

Gorbad is the most traditional addition to the roster in this DLC, given that he wants to conquer territory as normal. However, his core mechanic breaks up different conventions – some that a lot of Total War players tend to follow unconsciously. Once we find an army composition we like, we tend to rebuild it time and again, right? We tend to lose sight of one of this game’s greatest strengths, which is the sheer depth of its unit pool. Well, Gorbad is here to remind us with his special mechanic, Da’ Plan.

Gorbad’s armies have three Da’ Plan slots for Tactics, which are temporary buffs that can be activated in exchange for Planz – and Planz are gained with every victory on the battlefield. The unique thing about Tactics is that each one requires you to have specific units in your army. Net Dem Up!, for example, is only available if you have at least one goblin infantry unit and three missile cavalry or missile chariot units in your army, providing the latter group a strong ranged damage bonus and the former an active ability that can stop enemy units from moving – it creates great synergy.

There are tons of Tactics on offer, each inviting you to experiment with your army compositions and finding the perfect balance between comfort and innovation. I can’t express how genius this is – it’s not only the perfect way to express Gorbad’s personality and lore on a mechanical level, but elevates it on to a meta level, shaking up how we, as players, think about armies. Yes, we’re the orcs that need to find a fresh approach to what they’re doing. Remember what I wrote above, that I tend to prefer defensive factions, gravitating towards them all the time?

Gorbad always has Da Plan. / Creative Assembly / SEGA

Well, Gorbad got me. He’s shown me that I need to step out of my comfort zone sometimes and that other enjoyable factions are just over the horizon. It helps that the DLC comes with a great line-up of units – the Greenskins’ new Legendary Hero, for example, paves the way for an army focused entirely on spider riders. A cheap artillery piece helps reinforce their identity as a true combined-arms faction. The new lord type provides a great mix of magic and muscle, being able to club enemies to death while chanting spells. Arachnarok Spider Flingers? Terrifying! Mangler Squigs? Ridiculous in the best way.

Given that orcs and goblins were already in a much better position than the Daemons of Khorne and Ogres, their faction rework is a little smaller – but still brought some great additions, like the ability to choose special reward units for successful Waaaghs, changes to the economy, and an increased limit of Scrap upgrades a unit can receive. In short: You get to make more decisions and form armies that are much more to your taste.

Naturally, a major update comes with a large potential for bugs and given the work-in-progress nature of the build I played, some of these were not rooted out. The AI also seemed somewhat more passive and cowardly than usual, which might prove a little divisive – it’s difficult to know how much of that will be visible in the release build, though.

Omens of Destruction puts three of the most destructive factions in Total War: Warhammer 3 in the best place they’ve ever been on top of offering two of the most unique campaign experiences available in the game – and that, I think, is the theme for this DLC, aside from the obvious angle of smashing armies and empires to pieces. Omens of Destruction is a mechanically innovative reminder of the beauty and wonder of Total War: Warhammer 3. 

Now excuse me, there are skulls to be reaped, there is money to be made, and there are planz to be formed.

Score: 8/10

Version tested: PC