Total War: EMPIRE — A New World unlocks a total of 44 new nations for play, split between existing minor factions and emergent ones!
So, if you want to reimagine a world in which the Mughal Empire never fell, now you can. Want to defy the odds and turn Dagestan into a global superpower, or beat Simón Bolívar to the punch in liberating Gran Colombia? Step right up.
With A New World, history is yours to rewrite, over and over again.
The Empire’s New Clothes
Drawing directly from their histories, many of these nations have new National Traits and unit variants which help to shape their playstyles. As an example, let’s take a look at the Mysoreans:
Their National Trait ‘European Experts’ models the rapid modernisation of the sultanate’s military under Sultan Haidar and his son Tipu Sultan. They saw the devastating impact of the East India Company’s control of parts of the subcontinent, and enlisted hundreds of (mainly French) mercenaries to train their armies in European techniques.
This is reflected in a doubling of the speed at which tier 2 technologies are researched, enabling Mysore to resist more ably against the rapacious British, as they did historically.
They also gain access to a new "Mysorean Line Infantry" unit, whose full range of technological enhancements mirror those of European line infantry (namely bayonets, square formation & fire-by-rank drills) — significantly improving firepower and versatility in the mid-campaign.
Garibaldi? Never Heard of Him
Other examples include the minor nations of the Italian peninsula. They share the new Italian Unification Nation Trait, which offers a sidequest for factions such as Genoa, Savoy, and Venice. If they’re able to hold the entire peninsula, as well as Sardinia, they’ll unlock powerful new bonuses, propelling them from obscurity to the world stage.
And, on the topic of Venice, they’ll have access to the new Royal Fleet Galley — a nod to the most serene republic’s slow adoption of sail-power. These ships benefit from the new Focused Force attribute, which gives an increasing discount to their upkeep for each additional Royal Galley in the same fleet, up to a maximum of -33% for fleets with at least twelve such galleys.
Some nations have received more balancing than others. For example, Mexico has multiple National Traits that weaken the economy in the early game, and strengthen it later on. Other nations have been left mostly untouched in order to provide extremely challenging campaign experiences for the more masochistic players out there.
The aim is to help the new, fledgling nations compete against the established powers, facilitating new and unique styles of play — while minimising any disruption to the play experience of the base game factions.
Age of Revolution
Those familiar with EMPIRE’s innovative government system will know that revolutions are a constant risk, and that new nations can emerge if rebels succeed in capturing certain capitals. Emergent nations, such as Scotland, Mexico and the Mamelukes are now playable from the beginning of the campaign! These factions are among the most interesting in A New World, and are fertile soil for players who like to experiment with counterfactual scenarios.
And there’s one emblematic revolutionary republic which has received a great deal of our attention, but we’ll be spilling the tea on that one in a later blog, so stay tuned.
World Warpath
The Native American factions were always present on the Grand Campaign’s map, though never playable outside of the Warpath DLC campaign, which enhanced them with improved research trees and unit rosters.
A New World makes the Iroquois, Cherokee, Plains Nations, Pueblo Nations and the Huron playable on the Grand Campaign for the first time, complete with all of their Warpath improvements. Now you have the opportunity to halt the flow of colonisation and even reverse it entirely, with Native American factions playable across all three of the Grand Campaign’s theatres of war!
And on the subject of Warpath, the next instalment of the ‘A New World’ blog will dive into both of the new campaign starts. Yes, we said both…
Until then, why not head over to our socials? There, you can let us know your thoughts on what you’ve seen of the expansion so far, and what your first nation pick is going to be when A New World releases on September 18th.
