From SEGA and Creative Assembly:
As Total War: ARENA enters Closed Beta, a major update, The Fury of Arminius, will hit the servers. This brings tons of new content in the form of a brand-new Faction and Commander, a new battle map, many rebalancing tweaks, and Beta monetisation options. Once more, we’d like to reiterate that there will be no server resets from here on in!
New faction: The Barbarians
Focusing on momentum, stealth, misdirection and devastating hit-and-run attacks, the Barbarians bring a ferocious and dynamic new playstyle to Total War: ARENA. This faction has also been designed to bring fresh balance to the game, providing hard counters to existing units, which can currently dominate matches in lower tiers.
New Commander: Arminius
Arminius, the legendary hero of The Battle of Teutoburg Forest, leads the Barbarians and brings powerful Orders which amplify their unique playstyle. With combined Orders in play, a Barbarian player can wrong-foot opponents, conduct guerrilla warfare and wreak swift havoc on the battlefield!
- Momentum: Arminius inspires his units to cover ground more swiftly. Their movement rate will continue to accelerate for a period after activation, and the Order wears off when they stop or enter combat.
- Frenzy: Entering a state of berserk rage, Barbarians under this Order will disregard their own safety and fight with great ferocity. While the effect is active, units will lose all their defence rating, but gain +50% melee attack. Frenzied units are ideal at carving through archer units, performing devastating flank attacks on already-engaged units, and cutting down enemy combatants as they flee.
- Scout: This Order greatly increases the vision-range of the target unit at the cost of some defence. A Scouting unit concealed in cover is ideal for gathering intelligence, helping to plan ambushes or spotting for artillery units. If an artillery unit using a Scouting unit’s vision scores hits against the enemy, a share of the experience gained goes to the Scouting unit.
- Infiltration: This Tier-4 Order enables the target unit to masquerade as a unit from the opposing team. When two minutes elapse or the unit enters combat, the ability is lost. Provided that opposing players do not identify the player’s name above an Infiltrating unit as belonging to the enemy team, the unit can act with impunity; performing surprise rear-attacks, disrupting advances, hunting down enemy artillery or grabbing unoccupied objectives.
New units:
Arminius may recruit a number of new units to his army up to Tier 3. Many of these units bring balance to the early tiers as they each fulfil a notable role in the field and offer solid counters. As these units are further balanced over time in the context of the greater game, new Barbarian units and tiers will also be introduced.
Unit - Tier - Description - Unit Orders
- Levy Riders - 1 - Light cavalry. Nippy, no charge, scouting and range killers - No unit orders
- Levy Tribesmen - 1 - Weak light swords - No unit orders
- Scout Riders - 2 - Light cavalry, short charge, range killers - Charge, fearsome presence
- Warband - 2 - Medium swords, high damage, poor defence - Frenzied charge
- Woodsmen - 2 - Light axes, poor open ground performance, keep to the forest - Frenzied charge, fearsome presence
- Axemen - 3 - Better Woodsmen - Harass, frenzied charge, fearsome presence
- Raiders - 3 - Light cavalry, range killers - Charge, harass, fearsome presence
Based upon the famous river in Italy which Caesar marched his legions across towards Rome, Rubicon has designed in response to community consultation.
Based in a river plain, Rubicon is a far more open-plan battle map than we’ve created before. This offers many flanking opportunities, and we expect to see Heavy Infantry and Cavalry excel in Rubicon battles. While the battle is fairly open, there is also some limited high ground which is ideal for artillery and ranged units.
The die is cast – Along the central line of the map is the river itself. This can be crossed in most places, but be aware of the consequences of where you choose to cross; the middle offers the shortest route to the enemy but is wide, deep and muddy, making it treacherous to ford, with the potential to be caught out in the open under enemy fire.
Through the grapevine – One side of the map consists of farmland, providing a wealth of crops to sneak your units through and across the bridge. However, be wary of the watchtower protecting the area – you may instead find yourself on the defensive from the enemy’s advance!
Beta monetisation options:
Monetization will be activated as a test: players are now able to purchase Gold for real money. As this is a testing phase, only the smallest Gold package will be activated for purchase. As a free-to-play game, monetization is needed in order to keep adding new features to the game and to maintain it as a service to players. ARENA is not intended to be pay to win, and this test will deliver feedback for improving monetisation systems.
Arminius: a brief history
Born in 18BC to Segimerus, chief of the Germanic Chersuci tribe, Arminius was taken hostage in his youth by the Romans. Transported to Rome, he lived as one of them, becoming a citizen and receiving a formal military education. He attained the noble rank of Equestrian and fought many campaigns for Rome. But while his body belonged to The Legion, his soul still belonged to the tribe.
With his deep knowledge of Germania and its people, the now seasoned Arminius was returned there some years later in the service of Rome, and in 9AD he spied his opportunity for vengeance. Under the cloak of a diplomatic envoy, he met with the local tribes and covertly rallied their support against Roman dominion. With the loyalty of the tribes secured, he then masterminded a staggering act of military defiance.
Arminius concocted reports of tribal rebellions north of the river Rhine, and urged the local Roman Governor, Publius Quinctillus Varus, to move his three legions north to their winter quarters, dealing with the uprisings en route. Varus had no reason to doubt his most trusted lieutenant and acted on his advice.
Under worsening conditions, Varus marched the legions through Teutoburg forest. Arminius rode ahead to scout the path, and once the legion was out of sight, he diverted to rendezvous with the tribes. As the Roman column snaked its way through the trees, Arminius and his Barbarians struck, bursting like knife-shadows from the deep woodland cover to skewer the centurions. It was one of the most shocking and effective ambushes in military history. Three entire Roman legions were annihilated, and on the final day of fighting, with no respite in sight, Varus fell on his sword in shame.
Arminius had taken every ounce of experience his Roman military career afforded him and manoeuvred the legions into a position that utterly negated the sturdiness of their drilled fighting formations. He had also expertly gauged the true strengths of the Barbarian warriors – their woodland prowess, lightning agility and naked ferocity – and played them to their greatest advantage.
The Battle of Teutoburg Forest was a mighty roar of Germanic independence that shocked Rome to its very foundations. The Empire would never again dominate Greater Germania as it once had, though Germanicus would return some years later to exact a brutal vengeance on the tribes that had bloodied Rome’s nose.
Full details of the Closed Beta and Fury of Arminius update can be found here
