We already had a rough idea of what to expect from the upcoming Warhammer 3 Immortal Empires map but it looks like previous estimates were a bit conservative. Creative Assembly finally gave us a good look at the full map and it’s absolutely humongous. We’re talking way over 500 settlements, more than 80 Legendary Lords, and almost 300 starting factions.
The developers recently made the announcement via a new blog post where they also gave us a few more details regarding the new Sea Lanes features. In addition, the devs also hinted at some exciting content we might end up seeing in the future. But before we talk about that let’s take a look at some stats.
Immortal Empires Map in Numbers
Despite launching in beta, Immortal Empires won’t gradually introduce the content in bits and pieces. Instead, we’re getting everything at once and there’s going to be an absolutely insane amount of content available on day one.
The Immortal Empires map will launch with 554 settlements, 278 starting factions, and 86 Legendary Lords. Some of these figures may change during the beta, but they still give us a good idea of just how massive this map is going to end up being.
For comparison, Warhammer 2’s Mortal Empires map comes with 401 settlements, 183 starting factions, and 74 Legendary Lords. Immortal Empires will feature 38% more settlements, 52% more starting factions, and 16% more Legendary Lords than its predecessor. And these are just the numbers at launch.
A plethora of Warhammer 2 DLC expanded Mortal Empires tremendously over the years so expect to see something similar with Immortal Empires as well.
Sea Lanes
Having a huge map like this can be both an advantage and a disadvantage. The biggest problem is that it would take you ages to traverse it from one side to the other in a turn-based game like Total War: Warhammer 3. Luckily, the introduction of Sea Lanes will alleviate that issue, at least to a certain extent.
Sea Lanes give players the ability to quickly travel from one point on the map to another. Based on the recently revealed map, it looks like there are going to be a total of eight Sea Lanes – four on the east side of the map and four on the west. This means we’ll be able to jump from Grand Cathay to Lustria or Naggarond without having to traverse the entire map.
It will still take you ages to get to certain places depending on your starting position but Sea Lanes are certainly a nice new addition. Who knows, CA may end up adding even more mechanics to make map traversal easier further down the road.
Future Warhammer 3 Content
Creative Assembly confirmed that certain landmasses will not be accessible at launch. Most notably, the lands of Kuresh and Ind. The fact that these areas will be present at launch is a pretty good indication that the Immortal Empires map will eventually expand to include them as well. It’s not necessarily a confirmation, though.
The devs stated that their priority has always been the races of the Eight Edition. But since they already added Grand Cathay to the game, we may end up seeing factions like Kuresh and Ind at some point as well. There are already eight Warhammer 3 factions but there’s definitely room for a few more.
Immortal Empires Release Date
The Immortal Empires map is set to launch in August. There’s no specific release date just yet but we’re certain to hear more about it in the near future. CA’s next blog post will be all about starting position so keep an eye out for that. In the meantime, we have an entire list of Warhammer 3 mods to keep you busy until Immortal Empires launches. Make sure to check it out.
