Creative Assembly is testing a second round of AI improvements for Total War: Warhammer 3: ‘We heard you loud and clear’

Changes to the campaign AI of Creative Assembly’s border-gore simulator Total War: Warhammer 3 were the focus of a recent beta test, which revealed one reason the AI was playing too defensively was a bug that made it overreact to the presence of a single hero. Since that beta a second round of improvements has been outlined, which Creative Assembly has detailed in a recent blog post.

The first enhancement will be a reduction of anti-player bias, meaning the AI will treat the player more like it treats other AI factions rather than inflating its view of our riskiness. The second is a tweak to distance scaling, which currently encourages the AI to stay home more than is ideal.

“One example is the Southlands World’s Edge Mountains province”, principle technical designer Radoslav Borisov notes, “the AI struggles to invade it normally.” This tweak will make foreign armies less likely to idle at base for no good reason. Conversely, changes to AI aggression will make nearby armies less likely to attack when they have no hope of winning.

Faction potential is due for a change as well. “We heard you loud and clear that having a variety of minor factions survive and potentially thrive is something you want to see.” Therefore underperforming factions will be getting a boost, meaning that Clan Moulder, the Warhost of the Apocalypse, Hag Graef, Itza, the Bloody Handz, Caravan of Blue Roses, Puppets of Misrule, and the Bonerattlaz will be more likely to survive—at least until we lift the fog of war on them.

Meanwhile, overperforming factions will have their potential reduced, meaning you’ll be less likely to see the Oracles of Tzeentch, Blooded Wanderers, Cult of Pleasure, and Khemri painting the map. In my last campaign the undead of Khemri were marching far from home all over the Old World for no good reason, so that’s a welcome change.

Finally, a bunch of bug fixes for the way AI factions use their specific campaign features are incoming:

• Sisters of Twilight will now try and actively pursue a specific item set in the Forge of Daith
• Disciples of Hashut, The Legion of Azgorh and The Warhost of Zharr will better navigate the Hell-Forge and focus on obtaining high tier manufactory options
• Vampire Counts factions will prioritize going for the Bloodline they are thematically aligned with
• Improved AI handling of the Bloodletting mechanic
• [Realms of Chaos specific] All Cathay factions will now properly try and capture back bastions
• [Realms of Chaos specific] Kurgan Warband will now properly choose targets after destroying bastion settlements

All these changes will be part of the new campaign AI beta, which you can opt into via Steam. Following that, senior community manager Steve Coleman says, “we have a team internally starting to explore changes that we think we can make to Sieges, and are hoping to bring you more on that in the summer.”