Hello, I've posted much of the following on Reddit a couple of weeks ago, but I was suggested to post here so the devs have a higher chance of seeing the post, and with yesterday's dev chat video, I've been encouraged to do so.

You can find the original post on the link below, but considering the forums are an official venue of communication for the devs, I would encourage the discussion to continue here.

The Reddit thread:
https://www.reddit.com/r/totalwar/comments/1f5x8ta/dear_ca_kislev_rework_dogs_of_war_aranessa_rework/

Regarding the humans of the Old World in Total War: Warhammer III:
 

1. Kislev rework
   a) Kislev's economy and recruitment should be placed on a comparable level to the changes the Empire has received in its ToD rework - even though there are mods for this (including my own), it would be good to see an official CA rework;
   b) Kostaltyn and Boris Ursus need their own game mechanics - they should have mechanics different from the Ice Court training mechanic, which mostly fits Katarin;
   c) Mother Ostankya's start position - again, even though there are mods for this (including my own), it would be good to have at least the option to have her start close to Kislev in Immortal Empires - the Skull Road (the current settlement of Tribeslaughter to be more specific) seems to be the perfect start position for her.  

    

2. Dogs of War/Southern Realms
   You probably have this one cooking. I'm rather certain most of us want to see Dogs of War at some point, and we want as much of them as possible. They've been dearly missed since Game 1 - Tilea, Estalia, Border Princes, and Marienburg. With Game 2, Araby is there to talk about as well.
   a) Tilea - 1/1;
   b) Estalia - not sure how exactly you're going to go about them, maybe Belladona will start there, but obviously they should be included in core Dogs of War DLC;
   c) Border Princes - Lietpold the Black as a possible named LL, or an interesting idea that was recently presented on this subreddit - a customisable human LL starting in the Border Princes:
   https://www.reddit.com/r/totalwar/comments/1f4dvnu/pls_ca_can_we_get_a_custom_border_prince_lord_in/
   d) Marienburg - Dogs of War/Empire crossover FLC material, coming with the Dogs of War DLC - what do you guys think?
   e) Araby - this is likely a GW issue, but we would all probably love to see official Araby in the game at some point as well (the OVN mod is awesome of course).  

    

3. Aranessa rework
   We need more of our living pirates. She doesn't necessarily need to go outside of the Vampire Coast race, she just needs to have choices in her campaign that would let her focus more on her living or undead pirates. It feels odd that she doesn't have more of a living pirate themed campaign from the get-go.  

    

4. Bjornlings
   This is the oddest one on my list, which doesn't seem to have garnered much attention when being mentioned elsewhere, so I'm going to make a case for them here as well.
   a) Ulfric Grondal - the High King of the Bjornlings, also father of Aranessa Saltspite, who casted her out for being mutated, as Legendary Lord;
   b) starting as a neutral faction, which gives offerings to the Chaos Gods out of fear and necessity, the Bjornlings have three choices:
   I. show their allegiance to the Chaos Gods and ravage the wide world, navigating the seas in their longboats;
   II. fight against the oppressive influences of the Chaos Gods, gaining the blessings of the Gods of Men to found a foothold of Order in the Norscan peninsula;
   III. try to stay neutral and not get drawn into regional wars, trade with your neighbours and go on far-away adventures, such as reclaiming Skeggi originally founded by the Bjornlings.  

    
 

These are the main ideas for TW: Warhammer III that I wanted to highlight, outside of other expected things to come, such as the Bretonnia and Norsca reworks, and a final Empire DLC focusing on the Cult of Ulric and/or knightly orders.  

Thank you for your attention, and please discuss!  

The rework Aranessa needs is to be moved to DoW.

I would rename Vampire Coast to Pirate Coast. With more living pirates (both units and lords/heroes) and with living sea monsters such as leviathans and prometheans.

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DarthEnderX-#6513 wrote:

The rework Aranessa needs is to be moved to DoW.

That's perfect opportunity to introduce double start for some LLs. Player could play Aranessa as VC LL, or as DoW LL, or perhaps even as Norscan LL. In the same way CoC LLs could provide alternative as monogod leaders. Mortal Monogod LLs (Thamurkan, Dechala, Sigwald, Arbaal) could be introduced to Norsca or WoC. Little work (all the content is there), plenty of replayability

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DarthEnderX-#6513 wrote:

The rework Aranessa needs is to be moved to DoW.

How exactly would that work? Instead of Southern Realms core units, she would have living pirates as core units, and access to Dogs of War's mercenary pool?

Please elaborate, as we don't have DoW as a race yet.

If it comes to Aranessa, it will feel best exactly at the Dogs of War and it will give the opportunity to replace. And then it will be possible to make a DLC for the update with Vampire Coast for example on Vangheist and adding LH namely Captain Drekla why not?

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DarthEnderX-#6513 wrote:

The rework Aranessa needs is to be moved to DoW.

The absolute dream, IMO would be for Aranessa to be moved to DoW and then they can give us a free Vampire Coast lord(for those who own the DLC) as "compensation" for her being removed. Especially since there's likely to be just 3 LL's alla Chaos Dwarfs, having Aranessa act as a fourth would be excellent.

Herald#9684 wrote:

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DarthEnderX-#6513 wrote:

The rework Aranessa needs is to be moved to DoW.

How exactly would that work? Instead of Southern Realms core units, she would have living pirates as core units, and access to Dogs of War's mercenary pool?

Please elaborate, as we don't have DoW as a race yet.

I imagine that she'd still get the Dogs of War core units, plus some pirates(heck they might make more pirates as part of the core units for DoW) and then access to the Regiments of Renown pool.

@Herald you forgot that fixing Ostankya requires map changes/map expansion.

Aranessa shouldn't be DOW she is and never has been a mercenary. Like the Empire even offered to make her a privateer against the Norscans and she responded by firing at them. Aranessa doesn't fight for coin and infact takes offense at the very notion.

Now should she get various DOW units? Yes, maybe instead even getting a limit on the undead units until she say captures the Galleons Graveyard. But in terms of the infamy and pirate mechanics she needs to stay in the Coast, rather than become a mercenary which she just isn't. And TBH I at least feel that undead pirates fit her more than Pike and Shot armies....

Sagez#6761 wrote:

@Herald you forgot that fixing Ostankya requires map changes/map expansion.

Don't think so, you could put her in Plesk or a renamed Tribeslaughter and she is fine.

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Anedon26#2490 wrote:

Aranessa shouldn't be DOW she is and never has been a mercenary. Like the Empire even offered to make her a privateer against the Norscans and she responded by firing at them. Aranessa doesn't fight for coin and infact takes offense at the very notion.

Now should she get various DOW units? Yes, maybe instead even getting a limit on the undead units until she say captures the Galleons Graveyard. But in terms of the infamy and pirate mechanics she needs to stay in the Coast, rather than become a mercenary which she just isn't. And TBH I at least feel that undead pirates fit her more than Pike and Shot armies....

Sagez#6761 wrote:

@Herald you forgot that fixing Ostankya requires map changes/map expansion.

Don't think so, you could put her in Plesk or a renamed Tribeslaughter and she is fine.

No she isn't. CA did a mistake, they could've removed that ugly void in IE, give us bigger Kislev and another magical forest. Whatever.

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DarthEnderX-#6513 wrote:

The rework Aranessa needs is to be moved to DoW.

Yes let's move Aranessa to a race that barely has any pirate, what a great improvement would that be /s

I did note in the interview they said Golgfag was the 'First' mercenary faction they had introduced.

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DarthEnderX-#6513 wrote:

Sartosa was literally introduced in the DoW armybook as a haven for mercenaries of the sea.

Living mercenaries fit Aranessa better than undead pirates.  At least the mercenaries aren't her mortal enemies.

She doesn't even hate Undead, her mortal enemies is the Dreadfleet not every undead. Also there are Undead in Sartosa in the lore, there were even a couple of official models of Undead Sartosan Pirates in a White Dwarf. Yes Aranessa should get a lot more living units, she shouldn't be spreading vampiric corruption and she does need a rework but moving her to DoW is a) never going to happen b) not the right answer to fix her campaign.

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Neodeinos#5871 wrote:

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DarthEnderX-#6513 wrote:

Sartosa was literally introduced in the DoW armybook as a haven for mercenaries of the sea.

Living mercenaries fit Aranessa better than undead pirates.  At least the mercenaries aren't her mortal enemies.

She doesn't even hate Undead, her mortal enemies is the Dreadfleet not every undead. Also there are Undead in Sartosa in the lore, there were even a couple of official models of Undead Sartosan Pirates in a White Dwarf. Yes Aranessa should get a lot more living units, she shouldn't be spreading vampiric corruption and she does need a rework but moving her to DoW is a) never going to happen b) not the right answer to fix her campaign.

Agreed. More living infrantry units. Maybe even more living operating war machines too.

In case of mechanics, she could get one where she steals war machine blueprints from other races and factions along with a Manaan-themed mechanic where she has access to additional mini-rites ala Kislev and Ogres, as well as recruit various aquatic units when certain conditions are met (and as a massive middle finger to her TWWII campaign ending).

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Neodeinos#5871 wrote:

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DarthEnderX-#6513 wrote:

Sartosa was literally introduced in the DoW armybook as a haven for mercenaries of the sea.

Living mercenaries fit Aranessa better than undead pirates.  At least the mercenaries aren't her mortal enemies.

She doesn't even hate Undead, her mortal enemies is the Dreadfleet not every undead. Also there are Undead in Sartosa in the lore, there were even a couple of official models of Undead Sartosan Pirates in a White Dwarf. Yes Aranessa should get a lot more living units, she shouldn't be spreading vampiric corruption and she does need a rework but moving her to DoW is a) never going to happen b) not the right answer to fix her campaign.

I'm not aware of Aranessa's lore in detail, but how I imagined Aranessa's rework was to have her keep access to a couple of undead Vampire Coast starting units and have all of her living pirates available from the start (with the caveat of building upgrades of course). To unlock the rest of the undead roster, she'd need to "choose the dark side" and ally with the Dreadfleet or something along the lines, similar to how Ostankya unlocks the rest of the Kislev roster.

As a reward for choosing the quote unquote "good side", she could gain access to Dogs' of War mercenary pool.

I don't think we should limit her to the one or the other, but rather give the player as much flexibility as reasonably possible.

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Neodeinos#5871 wrote:

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Yes let's move Aranessa to a race that barely has any pirate, what a great improvement would that be /s

You literally keep all the Vampire Coast mechanics and just tag her to DoW. She'd still keep all her unique pirate units, she's got units that the other Vampire Coast factions have already. She just goes from recruiting undead to hiring mercenaries to fight for her and her pirates. 

Aranessa just doesn't fit with the Vampire Coast. Period. It's an undead faction, feels that way, functions that way. I've played all three of the lords significantly more and she just feels out of place. Even if I ignore all my other misgivings.

There are other lords that would have fit better with undead pirates. Including some that would have been just as unique such as an undead skaven captain. They should have slotted something else there for that.