The Total War series pits players in a region and tasks them with mercilessly beating AI back as they conquer various provinces. With a pleasant mix of Campaign Map strategy turning into real-time battles where you push units across the terrain, seeking elevatory advantages, or a treeline to ambush your unwary attackers with. Whether that region players find themselves in is feudal Japan, Rome, or the Warhammer universe is up to which title you purchase.
Recently, their titles have been bogged down for various reasons; poor AI implementation, iffy DLC’s offering mechanics that were curiously absent during initial launch (yet ready for day one DLC), and good heavens the turn-times seem to increase exponentially. While developers Creative Assembly have their work cut out for them on the former, it does appear that the latter is now being addressed in a sizeable update for Total War: Warhammer II that has been titled The Potion of Speed patch.
The update itself consists of patch notes that take quite a while to work through; a lot more has changed on top of the titular part.
First and foremost, end-turn speed time has been drastically increased, although it varies based on what your personal rig can put out in terms of raw CPU power. Nonetheless, the five-minute waits that occupied mid-to-late game should now be a thing of the past; some argue that this alone makes it far more playable.
The Legendary Lords have all received a pleasant update to their portrait as well, featuring more definition in facial features and shading. The makeover looks attractive for all Lords, although signs of the community requesting this seems to be absent. Nonetheless, it’s a solid upgrade.
Factions have received a change in title only; the factions held different names depending on what version of Total War: Warhammer you’re playing. Creative Assembly looks to mitigate this by shifting naming conventions to a singular standard that will be adhered to in the upcoming third title.
Black Arks have received a rework as well; one that is welcomed within the community. Black Arks are now considered to be actual characters, with skills, traits, and items that can be earned, unlocked, and traded to respectively. Black Arks can finally blockade ports and attack coastal settlements, along with unique skills that will allow them to upgrade their army. With these changes, that were crafted in respect to the newest DLC The Shadow and The Blade, Black Arks have finally gone from target practice for your enemies to the indomitable fortresses that they are in lore.
Along with these massive changes, there are pages upon pages of bugfixes, ranging from framerate increases to AoE ranges. The amount of fixes is staggering, although curious as to how they’ve bottled these many changes up until a singular release. Nonetheless, the community is thus far rather pleased with the patch, and hopes it bodes well for the future of the series.
