Total War: Arena
| Total War Series |
|---|
 Total War: Three Kingdoms - Portal Total War Saga: Thrones of Britannia Medieval II: Total War - Portal |
Total War: Arena is a free-to-play, team-based, 10v10 multiplayer real time strategy (RTS) and multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) mix game by Creative Assembly. It is currently in Open Beta phase since 22nd of February, 2018.
It is developed by Creative Assembly, published by Wargaming, and both are in an Alliance called Wargaming Alliance. Sega's role is unknown, or if it has any at all.
For now it only runs on Windows.
Contents
General Information
Engine
The game engine is based on Rome II's, however it's heavily modified therefore porting things isn't so easy.
Gameplay
Total War: Arena is a new type of game for Total War, which is set in Antique Age. Though, there is a possibility that game's era will be expanded in the future.
It is a team vs team battle game where teams consist of 10 players while each player has 3 units to control under the command of an iconic, historical commander. Battles are made on custom made, unique battle maps, where team play, strategies, and tactics have a bigger role than classic Total War games.
Fog of War and Visibility
There is a real time FoW system in the game that limits the visibility range of both teams. It can be lowered by taking watch towers or moving units towards the boundaries of visibility range.
Each unit has its own visibility range bonus. Therefore more units will provide a better visibility.
However visibility range isn't permanent, so if all units leave an area, that area won't be inside of visibility range anymore.
Watch Towers
In every battle map there are few watch towers that players can capture. They extend the visibility range of whole team, which makes them vital.
Terrain
There are many terrain types in Arena, as well as their effects. Also these effects differ from unit to unit. For example forests are friendly to light units, but they aren't friendly to heavy units.
Terrains don't only have effects for unit stats, they have effects for visibility range too. For example a large grass field can lower it by much while an open field doesn't effect it, at all.
Unit Types
Just like in all Total War games; there are melee, missile and artillery units, including ferocious Wardogs and terrifying Elephants. And also every unit has its weight that causes some pros and cons.
For example while light units are the fastest, they won't be good at bracing and defending against higher weighted units. Of course the terrain type also has a say on these.
Unit Size
Each unit has up to 100 men and the number varies from unit to unit. For example while melee infantries consist of 100 men, missile infantries consist of 80 men, and the cavalry 40.
Unit Tree and Progression System
There is an extensive unit tree tier progression for each faction, where you can unlock new equipments or new units by either unit or free experience. And the maximum unit tier is 10.
Apart from progression system, there are a few units that can be bought with gold (the in-game currency) which are called "Premium units". They have some advantages such as getting %50 more resources from battles and not having any replenishment cost (silver), but they aren't stronger than regular units, in fact a bit weaker. And as they aren't tied to the unit trees, they can't unlock any new units.
Unit Orders and Consumables
Almost every unit has one or more unit orders that can be used when it's necessary. They are mostly active, but there are also some passive ones.
Apart from Unit orders all units can get up to 2 different types of consumables per battle, which are bought via either silver or gold. And just like unit orders, some of them are active and some are passive.
Also they can be deployable things like stakes, caltrops, tar (and barricades) which can hurt and/or slow down any unit passing by.
Commander Levels and Abilities
Each commander has its own level and 3 unique abilities, that are progressed over time. Commanders gain experience just like Units -though experience type is different- and use that experience to level up, unlock and/or upgrade their abilities.
Commander levels and Abilities are capped with 10 level.
Battle Rewards
There are 3 things that players can get from battles: Unit experience, Free experience (also known as Commander experience) and Silver.
If a player has more than one unit type in his army, a 'diversity' bonus will be activated, which will give %30 more unit xp to each unit after the battle.
Battle rewards depend on many things; although the player can get most of it from damaging the other team's units; spotting, helping to team (morale boost etc) , capturing/decapturing, damaging the morale, blocking the missiles etc. don't go unrewarded.
Meanwhile "Friendly fire" costs some good amount of silver to the player that causes it.
Premium
Players can choose to purchase one of the temporary Premium packs with in-game gold to get %50 more resources (silver, commander xp, unit xp) from battles.
Premium packs don't have anything to do with Premium units.
Events
Time to time Arena devs decide to make an event, it's sometimes in memory of an historical event or some gaming conference/event. Which mostly lasts 3 to 5 days.
Event type differs, but mostly they are in-game bonuses like more rewards. And considering that they last at least 3 days, they are very profitable for the players.
Also during events, on social media pages of Arena there might be key give aways for some gold and a premium unit.
Factions
Currently there are 4 playable factions in the game. Though, more can be expected.
- Rome (A mix of Republic and Empire)
- Greece (More like Hellenic)
- Barbarians
- Carthage
Commanders
Currently there are 14 playable commanders in the game.
Though it was said that there will be even more in the future.
Roman
- Julius Caesar
- His abilities are designed to make him a supporter and engineer (artillery, deployables) General.
- Germanicus
- His abilities are designed to make him a heavy assault General.
- Scipio Africanus
- His abilities are designed to make him a cavalry assault General.
- Sulla
Greek
- Alexander the Great
- His abilities are designed to make him a cavalry assault General.
- Leonidas
- His abilities are designed to make him a heavy defensive General.
- Miltiades
- His abilities are designed to make him a disrupter assault General.
- Cynane
- 1st female commander of the game.
- Her abilities based on supporting archer, javelin infantries and cavalry.
Barbarian
- Arminius
- He is the best and fastest scout General but also a good assaulter.
- Vercingetorix
- He is the best forest brawler General but also capable of disrupting enemy formations with his "Scorch" ability.
- Boudica
- 2nd female commander of the game.
- Ambiorix
Carthaginian
- Hannibal
- Hasdrubal
Maps
Currently there are 13 maps in the game, and more are expected.
Battle map is randomly chosen by the game. However not all of them are available to everyone as some of them are more complicated and advanced than others, therefore they require player to bring higher Tier units to the Matchmaking queue.
- Thermopylae
- Marathon
- Salernum
- Germania
- Rubicon
- Alpis Graia
- Gergovia
- Hadrian's Wall
- Capitoline Hill
- Passage of Augustus
- Teutoburg Forest
- Oasis
- Capua
Downloadable Content
There isn't any confirmed DLC yet. Though it's a possibility that they make Blood & Gore in the future.
System Requirements
Note that they may change any time as the game gets patched time to time.
Minimum:
- OS: Windows 7
- Processor: Intel Core i3-550 or AMD Phenom II x4 945
- Memory: 2 GB RAM
- Graphics: ATI Radeon HD 5750 or Nvidia GeForce GTS 450
- DirectX®: Version 9.0c
- Hard Drive: About 8 GB HD space
- Internet Connection Speed: 256 Kbps
Recommended:
- OS: Windows 7+ 64-bit
- Processor: Intel Core i3-2120 @3.30 GHz or equivalent
- Memory: 4GB RAM
- Graphics: AMD Radeon HD 6870 or Nvidia GeForce GTX 560
- DirectX®: Version 9.0c
- Hard Drive: About 8 GB HD space
